Tag: biofuels

  • Mining the Soil for Biomass Energy

    Min­ing the Soil for Bio­mass Ener­gy — Thurs­day, April 16 at 1 pm PT / 4 ET Jon Rhodes, water­shed hydrol­o­gist, has more than thir­ty years of pro­fes­sion­al expe­ri­ence eval­u­at­ing the impacts of log­ging and road build­ing on for­est ecosys­tems and water­sheds. Jon runs Plan­e­to Azul Hydrol­o­gy, which pro­vides afford­able water­shed exper­tise for a wide vari­ety of con­ser­va­tion…

  • USDA Spends $9 Million More on Biomass Energy

    - U.S. For­est Ser­vice, April 9, 2015 Today, Agri­cul­ture Sec­re­tary Tom Vil­sack announced the award of over $9 mil­lion to expand and accel­er­ate wood ener­gy and oth­er wood prod­uct mar­kets. The fed­er­al funds will lever­age $22 mil­lion in invest­ments from part­ners, result­ing in a total invest­ment of $31 mil­lion in 23 states. “Work­ing with our part­ners,…

  • Biomass Company Owes Lawrence County, Ohio Back Taxes

    - Beni­ta Heath, April 8, 2015, Iron­ton Tribune Two months after Bio­mass own­er Mark Har­ris paid off two-thirds of the back tax­es he owed on prop­er­ty at The Point indus­tri­al park, he has yet to pay any of the first half tax­es for 2014. Those tax­es, due on March 6, total $5,193.49 on all six parcels, plus…

  • Study: Biofuel Crops Replacing Grasslands, Contributing to CO2 Emissions

    - April 4, 2015, Grand Island Independent A new study from Uni­ver­si­ty of Wis­con­sin-Madi­son researchers show that crops, includ­ing the corn and soy­beans used for bio­fu­els, expand­ed onto 7 mil­lion acres of new land in the U.S. over a recent four-year peri­od, replac­ing mil­lions of acres of grasslands. The study — from UW-Madi­son grad­u­ate stu­dent Tyler…

  • Fire at Biomass Power Facility in Thailand

    - April 8, 2015, Bangkok Post A bio­mass pow­er plant with large piles of palm ker­nel shells used for fuel caught fire in Khao Phanom dis­trict of Kra­bi ear­ly Wednes­day morn­ing, and dam­age was esti­mat­ed at 100 mil­lion baht.  The fire at Saraff Ener­gies Co start­ed about 1.30am. The plant was tem­porar­i­ly closed for maintenance.  It first emerged…

  • Boardman, Oregon Coal Plant Mulls Biomass

    - by George Plaven, April 6, 2015, EO Media Group As a poten­tial source of renew­able ener­gy, giant cane could be the answer to sav­ing Port­land Gen­er­al Electric’s coal-fired pow­er plant in Board­man long after the facil­i­ty quits using coal by 2020. On the oth­er hand, as an inva­sive species, giant cane could spread wild across the Colum­bia…

  • Bill to Subsidize California Biomass Facilities

    - by John Cox, April 6, 2015, Bak­ers­field Californian Local farm­ers are adding their sup­port to leg­is­la­tion that would divert rev­enue from California’s cap-and-trade pro­gram to bio­mass plants that gen­er­ate pow­er by burn­ing agri­cul­tur­al and urban green waste. Last month the Kern Coun­ty Farm Bureau co-host­ed a meet­ing in Delano to raise aware­ness of Assem­bly Bill 590…

  • Public Weighs in on Plumas County, CA Biomass Proposal

    - by Debra Moore, April 5, 2015, Plumas Coun­ty News The Sier­ra Insti­tute is poised to receive $2.6 mil­lion from the Cal­i­for­nia Ener­gy Com­mis­sion, but first the pub­lic will have a chance to com­ment on the bio­mass boil­er that would be built near the county’s health and human ser­vices build­ing in Quincy. The com­mis­sion announced March 10…

  • Biofuels Gain Traction at Minnesota Legislature

    - by Jon Collins, March 31, 2015, Min­neso­ta Pub­lic Radio A bill to cre­ate a $5 mil­lion tax cred­it to advance the devel­op­ment of the bio­fu­el indus­try in Min­neso­ta is gain­ing trac­tion at the state Legislature. New­er tech­nolo­gies allow the use of plants like native prairie grass­es or alfal­fa for con­ver­sion ethanol. The so-called advanced bio­fu­el tax…

  • Plainfield, Connecticut Biomass Facility Changes Hands Again

    - by Bri­an Dowl­ing, March 25, 2015, Hart­ford Courant Lei­dos Inc. is sell­ing its Plain­field wood-fired pow­er plant to Green­leaf Pow­er, a Sacra­men­to com­pa­ny that is buy­ing bio­mass plants across North America. Green­leaf Pow­er announced Wednes­day it has agreed to buy the 37.5‑megawatt pow­er plant in a deal it expects to close lat­er this year. The com­pa­ny…