Posted on October - 14 - 2010
Look at fuel crops of the future caps two-day biomass conference
Some 20 attendees of the Biomass South conference get a close look Friday at fuel crops that are growing at Agricenter International. Andrew Jordan explains the differences in sugar content found in a sweet sorghum plant.
Not satisfied with two days of PowerPoint presentations and panel discussions, a handful of Biomass South conference-goers wanted to see potential petroleum-replacing plants in the field.
So, about 20 intrepid farmers, academics and industry members loaded up on a tractor-pulled trailer to have a firsthand look at sweet sorghum, switch grass and sugar beets — all growing at Agricenter International.
The tour capped off the two-day conference that focused on growing, processing and using biomass, or biological raw materials like crops or forest products, to replace petroleum in many products such as fuels and plastics.
The conference, hosted by the Memphis Bioworks Foundation, the Southeast Agriculture & Forest Energy Resources Alliance and the Southern Growth Policies Board, drew stakeholders from across the country, including Jose Olivares, the biofuels director of Los Alamos National Laboratory, and Dallas Tonsager, undersecretary for rural development in the U.S. Department of Agriculture, to the University of Memphis.
Friday’s keynote speaker, U.S. Rep. Steve
Cohen, stressed the importance of finding alternatives, like those derived from biomass, for fossil fuels.
“We are facing a crisis. We are eating our own planet,” the Memphis Democrat said. “Al Gore was right.”
Sumesh Arora, director of Mississippi’s Strategic Biomass Solutions, said that while biofuels won’t completely replace oil any time soon, it is important to diversify the planet’s fuel portfolio.
“If you look at the transportation sector, 95 percent of it relies on fossil fuels, and that is a huge threat to national security,” Arora said. “It’s like going to an investment adviser; the first thing he’ll tell you is to make sure your portfolio is diversified.”
To help do that, Arora said Mississippi has agreed to a $75 million loan to Texas-based renewable crude company KiOR to build an ethanol-processing demonstration plant in Columbus, Miss. Other such plants are in the works in Mississippi in Fulton and Pontotoc.
Back at the Agricenter’s crop tour, Pete Nelson, AgBio for Memphis Bioworks Foundation, said people are interested in the work in the Memphis region because it doesn’t just exist in a theory. It’s in the ground.
“We’re actually growing these crops, and have processing facilities set up around the region that are getting ready to process these materials and real chemical companies that want to work with them,” Nelson said.
“The whole conference had a tone that these are real doers. They are really putting these things together and it’s not abstract, and (the crop tour) reiterates that.”
Jim Coleman contributed to this story.
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