Pongamia trees grow where citrus trees once flourished, offering renewable energy and plant-based proteins

An ancient tree from India is now thriving in orchards where citrus trees once flourished in Florida, and could help provide the country with renewable energy.

As much of the Sunshine State’s once-famous citrus industry has all but dried up over the past two decades due to two deadly diseases, citrus greening and citrus canker, some farmers are turning to the pongamia tree, a climate-resistant tree with the potential to produce plant-based proteins and a sustainable biofuel.

For years, pongamia has been used to shade trees, producing legumes – little brown beans – that are so bitter that wild pigs won’t even eat them.

But unlike the orange and grapefruit trees that long occupied these rural Florida woodlands northwest of West Palm Beach, pongamias don’t need much attention.

Pongamia trees also do not need fertilizers or pesticides. They flourish in dry or rainy conditions. And they don’t require teams of workers to harvest the grains. A machine simply shakes the small beans off the branches when they are ready for harvest.

Terviva, a San Francisco-based company founded in 2010 by Naveen Sikka, then uses its patented process to remove the biopesticides that cause the bitter taste, making the grains suitable for food production.

“Florida offers a rare opportunity for both Terviva and former citrus growers. The historic decline of the citrus industry has left farmers without a crop that could grow profitably across hundreds of thousands of acres, and there needs to be a very scalable replacement, very soon,” Sikka told The Associated Press. “Pongamia is the perfect fit.”

Pongamia is a wild tree native to India, Southeast Asia and Australia.

The legume is now being used to produce various productsincluding Panova table oil, Kona protein bars and protein flour.

Legumes also produce oil that can be used as biofuel, particularly for aviation, which leaves a very low carbon footprint, said Ron Edwards, chairman of Terviva and a longtime citrus grower in Florida.

Turning a wild tree into a domestic one wasn’t easy, Edwards said.

“There are no books to read about it either, because no one else has done it,” he said.

Bees and other pollinators feed on pongamia flowers, supporting local biodiversity, Edwards said. One acre of trees can potentially provide the same amount of oil as four acres of soybeans, he added.

What remains after the oil is removed from the pongamia beans is “a high-quality protein that can be used as a substitute in baking, smoothies and all kinds of other plant-based protein products,” Edwards said. “There is a lot of potential for the food industry and the oil and petroleum industry.”

“We know that pongamia grows well in Florida, and the end markets for the oil and protein from pongamia grains – biofuels, feed and food ingredients – are huge,” Sikka said. align closely with the cutting edge of sustainable agricultural practices.”

At a nursery near Fort Pierce, workers skilled in pongamia grafting techniques attach a portion of the mother tree to a pongamia rootstock, which ensures that the genetics and desired characteristics of the mother tree are perpetuated in all Terviva trees.

Citrus was Florida’s main crop for years until diseases struck, starting in the 1990s with citrus canker and later greening.

Citrus canker, a bacterial disease, does not harm humans, but causes lesions on fruits, stems and leaves. Eventually, this makes the trees unproductive.

Citrus greening, also known as Huanglongbing, slowly kills trees and degrades fruit, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Greening has spread throughout Florida since 2005, devastating countless orchards and reducing citrus fruit production by 75%. The disease spread to Louisiana, Texas and California.

Hurricane Ian caused approx. $1.8 billion in damages for Florida agriculture in September 2023, hitting the citrus industry at the start of its growing season.

Disease and climate issues have also affected most of the world’s major citrus-producing countries. For example, this year’s harvest in Brazil – the world’s largest exporter of orange juice – is expected to be the worst in 36 years due to floods and droughts, according to a forecast from Fundecitrus, an organization of citrus fruit producers in the state of São Paulo.

But weather and disease have little effect on pongamia trees, company officials said.

“It’s just tough, a jungle-tested tree,” Edwards said. “It withstands a lot of abuse with very little care.”

Pongamia also grows well in Hawaii, where it now thrives on land previously used for sugar cane.

John Olson, owner of Circle O Ranch west of Fort Pierce, replaced his grapefruit orchards with 215 acres (87.01 hectares) of pongamia trees.

“We went through all the ups and downs of citrus and eventually, because of greening, we abandoned citrus production,” Olson said. “For the most part, the citrus industry is dead in Florida.”

Although the grapefruit orchard was modest, it was common for an orchard of that size to be profitable in the 1980s and 1990s, Olson said.

Edwards said farmers used several sprays to kill the insect that spread the disease. Eventually, the cost of caring for citrus trees became too risky.

It was then that he decided to follow a different path.

“What attracted me to pongamia was the fact that I could reuse fallow land that was citrus and is now dormant,” he said. “From an ecological point of view, it is very attractive because it can replace some of the vegetable oils and proteins that are now being generated by products like palm oil, which is a much more environmentally damaging crop.”

In December 2023, Terviva signed an agreement with Mitsubishi Corporation to supply biofuel feedstock that can be converted into biodiesel or renewable diesel.

“Our partnership with Mitsubishi is off to a great start,” said Sikka, noting that the company coordinates closely with Mitsubishi on tree planting and product development and sales. “Terviva’s progress has accelerated thanks to Mitsubishi’s worldwide expertise and leadership in all facets of Terviva’s business.”

The research is ongoing, but Edwards said they made really good cookies in addition to table oil and other plant-based protein products, including flour and protein bars.

Pongamia offers an alternative to soy and yellow pea protein “if you don’t want your protein to come from meat,” he said.