$10 Million Taxpayer Money to Convert Beetle-Killed Trees to Biofuel

$10 Mil­lion Tax­pay­er Mon­ey to Con­vert Bee­tle-Killed Trees to Biofuel

- by Ash­ley Sanchez, Novem­ber 6, 2013, Source: ABC Fox Montana

The Uni­ver­si­ty of Mon­tana is award­ed part of a $10 mil­lion grant to find ways to turn bee­tle-killed trees into biofuel.

Pine bee­tle infes­ta­tions have impact­ed more than 42 mil­lion acres of U.S. forests for more than a decade, accord­ing to the U.S. Depart­ment of Agri­cul­ture. Now offi­cials said they think there could be a way to put pine bee­tle-killed trees and oth­er for­est residue to use.

“A lot of times we think of things left behind in the woods as waste, but much of it can be used for our ben­e­fit,” said Jim Burch­field, Dean of the Col­lege of Forestry and Conservation.

The USDA announced on Wednes­day, it’s award­ing $10 mil­lion dol­lars to a group of orga­ni­za­tions look­ing to study the major chal­lenges in using insect-killed trees for ener­gy pro­duc­tion at bio­mass burn­ing facilities.

“The car­bon that’s stored in trees gets re-cir­cu­lat­ed through the atmos­phere, and if we can use that type of ener­gy instead of oth­er types of ener­gy, that helps our car­bon foot print,” Burch­field said.

UM will get more than $1 mil­lion of the grant over five years to help study issues relat­ed to using for­est waste in bio­fu­el production.

“A key aspect is eco­nom­ic con­tri­bu­tions to ener­gy pro­duc­tion,” Burch­field said. 

Burch­field said while there are many advan­tages to using bee­tle kill for renew­able fuel pro­duc­tion, there are also bar­ri­ers. USDA offi­cials said the wood is often locat­ed in areas far from urban indus­tri­al cen­ters, often in areas that are hard to reach.

“It costs to be able to move mate­r­i­al from the for­est to an ener­gy facil­i­ty, so he is going to be look­ing at dif­fer­ent lev­els of effi­cien­cy,” Burch­field said.

UM will main­ly look at the eco­nom­ic impacts of the project. A UM forestry pro­fes­sor and his research team will look at costs, machine pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and oth­er fac­tors in get­ting for­est residue to a bio­fu­el facility.

“This way we can use it for ener­gy and cre­ate jobs for peo­ple to be able to move that mate­r­i­al into ener­gy pro­duc­tion facil­i­ties,” Burch­field said.

UM is col­lab­o­rat­ing with part­ners across four states to com­plete the project. For more infor­ma­tion, you can vis­it the part­ner­ship’s web­site.