New York and North Carolina Farmers Joining The U.S. Biomass Crop Assistance Program
July 31, 2012 Kyriaki (Sandy) Venetis New York and North Carolina are the two newest states to join America’s growing biofuel industry. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has authorized an investment of $9.6 million that will be distributed for the creation of the two new projects and the expansion of the already existing project in Arkansas.
Graphic courtesy of Environment, Health, and Safety News.
New York and North Carolina are joining 10 other states – Arkansas, California, Kansas, Missouri, Montana, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Washington – in the Biomass Crop Assistance Program (BCAP), whose purpose is to expand the nation’s non-food grade energy crops to be used in manufacturing liquid biofuels.
The energy crops being grown, such as giant miscanthus, switch grass, and shrub willow, are the “first ever national investments in expanding U.S. biomass resources to meet domestic energy needs,” said the USDA, which adds that the current “total investment in those projects is estimated to be $55 million.”