MAES retools, renames facility to fuel Michigan’s bioeconomy efforts

Michigan State University
Published: Feb. 08, 2010 E-mail Editor

EAST LANSING, Mich. — To better assist the state’s biomass producers and the emerging bioenergy industry, the Michigan Agricultural Experiment Station is retooling and renaming one of its Upper Peninsula facilities.

One of 15 MAES specialized research facilities around Michigan, the Upper Peninsula Tree Improvement Center, or UPTIC, near Escanaba has been renamed the Michigan State University Forest Biomass Innovation Center to emphasize the evolving focus of MAES research activities there.

“The old name speaks to a traditional scope of activities – fiber farming research, silviculture, forest genetics and forested wetland research – that were appropriate when UPTIC was established in 1986,” said MAES Director Steve Pueppke, who also is director of the MSU Office of Biobased Technologies. “These activities have not ceased, but with the advent of the bioeconomy and MSU’s strategic focus on it, refining our programs in Escanaba and renaming the facility make good sense, both geographically and economically.”

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Corn Ethanol Gets Obama's Support

Forbes.com
Jonathan Fahey, 02.09.10, 06:00 AM EST

EPA mandate for more corn ethanol puts brighter sheen on the biofuel.

Score another one for the corn farmers. Corn ethanol has long been ridiculed as a vote-getting farmer-subsidy program that does little or nothing to help the nation reduce its dependence on foreign oil or cut its greenhouse gas emissions.

But suddenly, corn doesn't look so bad, according to the Obama administration. EPA Chief Lisa Jackson said on Feb. 3 that after considering the latest science on crop yields, land use and ethanol-production efficiency, corn ethanol can be quite a good thing, after all. Those findings were incorporated into a rule implementing a congressional mandate for biofuel use nationwide that will allow at least an extra 2 billion gallons of corn ethanol to be produced and perhaps much, much more.

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Chu says that DOE has released only $2.1 billion out of $37 billion in Recovery Act funds

BiofuelsDigest.com
February 09, 2010 Jim Lane

In Washington, Energy Secretary Steven Chu said, in Senate testimony regarding the FY 2011 budget, that only $2.1 billion of the $37 billion in Recovery Act funding given to Energy to disperse had been spent. Chu said that the complex review process required for projects had slowed the disbursement, and blamed state and local governments were having trouble absorbing the bureaucratic requirements associated with the dispersal of funds.

However, a report in the Wall Street Journal said that “Massachusetts officials say Dr. Chu’s agency took nearly seven months to determine whether the state’s proposal to spend $55 million on insulation, window replacement and other projects required a review under the National Environmental Policy Act, a federal law that requires agencies to make sure federally funded projects won’t harm the environment.” An internal review by the Department’s inspector general found in december over staffing shortages and the risk of fraud.

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Missouri researchers develop algal fuels ecosystem using brine shrimp, tilapia

Biofuels Digest
February 03, 2010 Jim Lane

In Missouri, researchers at the University of Missouri have released details of an ecosystem for producing renewable fuel oil from harvested brine shrimp, which in turn consume algae cultivated in open raceway ponds adjacent to a 50 MW natural gas power plant.

The researchers say that brine shrimp take care of the problem of harvesting algae, and themselves are separated by more traditional processes into oils, proteins, and waste matter that can be converted to biogas via anaerobic digestion. The system can produce up to 500 gallons of biodiesel per acre, according to the research team. Tilapia are also introduced into the system to consume excess algae as well as other microorganisms, and keep the system productive and water clean.

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USB finds that US soybean data nine years out of date...

BiofuelsDigest.com
February 09, 2010 Jim Lane

...study provides updates with material changes in lifecycle analysis

In Missouri, the United Soybean Board (released a new peer-reviewed life cycle profile conducted by Omni Tech International. Currently, data included in the Department of Energy’s U.S. Life Cycle Inventory is based on three years, 1998 to 2001. The project aimed to incorporate date from 2001-2007.

Key findings: The average soybean yield for 2004-2007 was 42.3 bushels per acre. This represents a 12 percent increase over the data (1998-2000 average) used in the current U.S. LCI database. The release of nitrous oxide (N2O), a greenhouse gas, is 85% less than the data contained in the current U.S. LCI Database. The updated data also show approximately 20% less direct energy used in soybean farming due to reduced diesel and gasoline usage, a 45% energy reduction by soybean processing centers and a 27 percent energy use reduction by biodiesel processing centers.

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EPA ethanol rules good news for farmers

The Witchita Eagle
Posted on Sun, Feb. 07, 2010
BY DAN VOORHIS

The EPA’s conclusion that growing, harvesting, making and transporting corn-based ethanol generates less greenhouse gas than producing gasoline is good news for ethanol producers.
Ethanol producers are claiming a significant victory after the federal government last week bolstered their long-standing claim that ethanol is friendlier to the environment than gasoline.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued new rules and targets for biofuels called the National Renewable Fuel Standard.

The EPA concluded that growing, harvesting, making and transporting corn-based ethanol generates 20 percent less greenhouse gas than producing gasoline.

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University of Illinois Scientists Find High-Protein DDGS Provide Valuable Feed Options for Swine Producers

Grainnet.com
Date Posted: February 5, 2010

As swine producers continue to find ways to survive in today’s economic situation, researchers at the University of Illinois are exploring alternative feedstuffs in growing pig diets to provide producers with more options.

Hans H. Stein, U of I associate professor in the department of animal sciences, said his team’s research has shown that high-protein distillers dried grains can replace 100 percent of the soybean meal in a diet fed to finishing pigs without any effect on growth performance or carcass characteristics as long as the diets are fortified with crystalline Lysine, Threonine and Tryptophan.

High-protein distillers dried grains are produced through a fractionation technology.

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