Note: An extended version of this press release was originally published by the Department of Energy. The funding of energy crops — including camelina, a plant that can be used to generate renewable propane — could impact renewable propane research efforts.
The U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE's) Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) has announced $52 million in funding for six university and industry projects to advance the production of low carbon intensity, purpose-grown energy crops critical to accelerating a clean energy bioeconomy. These projects will expand a domestic supply chain of alternative carbon sources essential to biofuels and bioproducts production that can lower net emissions in the transportation and industrial sectors, as well as innovate and grow the U.S. agricultural industry.
Investment in this research supports DOE's long-term objective to develop technologies that mobilize renewable carbon resources to increase the production of bioenergy and renewable chemicals and materials. Prime funding recipients are located in six states with proposed field and pond experiments across 18 different states. These selected projects will focus on the advancement of low carbon intensity, purpose-grown energy crops across varied agronomic and geographic landscapes through the generation of data and research findings. The projects will focus on one or more of the following feedstock resources: microalgae, switchgrass, miscanthus, high biomass sorghum, carinata, camelina, pennycress and shrub willow.
"DOE's investment in biofuels and bioproducts is critical to the federal government's efforts to support innovative energy research," said Jeff Marootian, principal deputy assistant secretary for DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. "Expanding our domestic supply chain of energy crops, like algae and switchgrass, will ensure that we can continue to develop cutting-edge technologies that significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions, create high-quality jobs across the agricultural industry and increase our energy independence."
