Department of Energy

• Chu appointment delights energy campaigners, 16 December 2008 by the Financial Times: "The appointment of Steven Chu as US energy secretary has been welcomed in the US and around the world by scientists and campaigners on climate change as presaging a dramatic change in the US approach to global warming."
  • "It represents a blow to coal-fired power generation in the US, and a boost for new nuclear plants and for advanced biofuels such as cellulosic ethanol, typically made from plant waste instead of food crops."
  • "Mr Chu was instrumental in bringing to [the University of California] Berkeley a $500m grant from BP, the British oil group, to set up the Energy Biosciences Institute, a research foundation working to find new biofuels using biotechnology."
  • "He is sceptical of traditional ethanol, saying he would 'rather drink it', but has enthusiastically backed more advanced biofuels produced from non-food crops such as miscanthus, sometimes known as elephant grass."[9]

• Obama Team Set on Environment, 11 December 2008, by the New York Times: "President-elect Barack Obama has selected...Nobel Prize-winning physicist" Steven Chu, "the director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, as his energy secretary".
  • "At the Lawrence Berkeley laboratory, [Dr. Chu] has sponsored research into biofuels and solar energy and has been a strong advocate of controlling greenhouse gas emissions."[10]
  • More:
    • According to Dr. Chu's official biography, "On Chu's initiative, Lab staffers from many divisions have joined with partners from other Department of Energy labs, universities, and industry to organize the BioEnergy Institute and the Energy Biosciences Institute. Chu has also been the driving force behind a multidisciplinary energy science center known as Helios, slated to begin construction on the Berkeley Lab site in 2010."
    • "At the heart of each institute and proposal is the belief that biological engineering of non-food plants, combined with nanoscience, can create liquid fuels and electricity from sunlight."

• Emeryville Biofuel Institute Dedicated, 2 December 2008, by the San Francisco Chronicle:
  • "The new Emeryville [California] facility, funded for five years with $135 million from the Department of Energy, has recruited renowned scientists, as well as graduate and postdoctoral students, to take on the toughest obstacles in creating new biofuels by using modern genomics and molecular biology, robotics and mass spectrometry, chemistry and materials analysis."
  • Jay Keasling "said the institute's leading scientists consult with representatives of nine companies a couple of times a year about its research. He also plans to bring in entrepreneurs who can help identify positive technology and build the business case for taking a specific technology to market."
  • "Anna Palmisano, associate director of the Department of Energy's Office of Science for Biological and Environmental Research, said the institute in Emeryville is on 'the front lines of the next green revolution.'" [11]

• U.S. announces 'Biofuels Action Plan', 7 October 2008 by Science News: "U.S. government officials have released the National Biofuels Action Plan (PDF file), an interagency plan to accelerate development of a sustainable biofuels industry."
  • "U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer and Department of Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said the plan is in response to President George Bush's goal of cutting U.S. gasoline consumption by 20 percent in the next 10 years.
  • "Bodman said the plan is a 'strategic blueprint' showing the way to increasing biofuels production by 2022. He said the plan shows how to accomplish that goal 'in cost-effective, environmentally responsible ways that utilize a science-based approach to ensure the next generation of biofuels that are made primarily from feedstocks outside the food supply that are produced sustainably.'"[12]

• DOE, USDA Granting More Than $10M to Ten Biofuel Genomics Studies, 31 July 2008 by GenomeWeb: "The US Departments of Energy and Agriculture today said that they will provide nearly $11 million over three years to fund 10 genomics research programs that can help develop bioenergy feedstocks for use in cellulosic biofuels."
  • ""Under the joint Plant Feedstock Genomics for Bioenergy program, the DOE will contribute $8.8 million from its Office of Biological and Environmental Research, and the USDA will provide $2 million through its Cooperative State Research, Education and Extension Service".[13]

• Boosting Cellulosic Biofuels - A catalytic process could improve thermochemical routes to ethanol, 28 July 2008 by Technology Review: "The Department of Energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratories (NREL) is to begin work testing a catalyst developed by Dow Chemical...to see if it can be used to massively boost the production of ethanol made from biomass".
  • "The partnership will attempt ways to make ethanol biofuel from cellulosic biomass, such as waste from corn or wood, using thermochemical processes".[14]

• DOE to Provide up to $40 Million in Funding for Small-Scale Biorefinery Projects in Wisconsin and Louisiana , 14 July 2008 press release by the U.S. DOE: "The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) today announced the selection of two small-scale cellulosic biorefinery projects in Park Falls, Wis. and Jennings, La. for federal funding of up to $40 million over five years."
  • "These two biorefinery projects are the final round of selections for DOE's competitive small-scale biorefinery solicitation. Earlier this year, DOE selected seven other projects, comparable in size and scope, to receive up to a total of $200 million."[15]

• Iogen Nixes Idaho for Ethanol Plant, Picks Saskatchewan, May 9 2008 by Canadian Press:
  • "For the last two years, Iogen had leaned toward building a cellulosic ethanol facility near the community of Shelley, near where farmers already are under contract to provide the wheat and barley straw, corn leaves and stalks, and switch grass used to produce ethanol."
  • "A U.S. Department of Energy spending package included loan guarantees and an US $80 million grant for the project, estimated in 2006 to cost up to US $350 million. But in March, the Canadian government announced it had allocated $500 million for projects to build next-generation biofuels plants in Canada." [16]

• Three New Cellulosic Biorefineries to Receive $86 Million from DOE, 23 April 2008, DOE Press Release: DOE announced on April 18 that it will invest $86 million over the next 4 years in three new cellulosic ethanol biorefineries, to be built by Ecofin, LLC; Mascoma; and RSE Pulp & Chemical, LLC. The small-scale biorefineries will produce ethanol from non-edible cellulosic biomass sources, such as corncobs, wood chips, and switchgrass. Cellulosic biomass has three main components: strong crystalline strands of cellulose, which are protected by hemicellulose, a complex carbohydrate, and the glue-like lignin...

• DOE Responds to TIME Magazine's Criticism of Ethanol, 24 April 2008, DOE Press Release: In the April 28 issue of TIME magazine, Energy Secretary Samuel W. Bodman and Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer rebutted the magazine's recent article about the use and development of ethanol. In their response, the Secretaries noted that second and third generation biofuels have the potential to reduce greenhouse gases, and that modern agriculture has the capacity to manage land use responsibly -- balancing our nation's needs for both fuel and food (also see food-versus-fuel debate).

• U.S. Department of Energy Selects First Round of Small-Scale Biorefinery Projects for Up to $114 Million in Federal Funding, 29 January 2008, DOE Press Release: "DOE will invest up to $114 million, over four years, (Fiscal Years 2007-2010) for four small-scale biorefinery projects" in Colorado, Missouri, Oregon and Wisconsin.
  • "Building on President Bush's goal of making cellulosic ethanol cost-competitive by 2012, these ten-percent of commercial-scale biorefineries will use a wide variety of feedstocks and test novel conversion technologies to provide data necessary to bring online full-size, commercial-scale biorefineries....Today's announcement is part of over $1 billion DOE has announced within the last year for multi-year biofuels research and development projects."

2007

• U.S. DOE to Invest in Cellulose-to-Ethanol Projects, 1 March 2007 by Renewableenergyaccess.com, reported that DOE announced 28 February 2007 that funding totalling $385 million will be provided to "six U.S. biorefinery projects over the next four years." The funding will promote research and development of cellulosic ethanol and methanol production. The companies are Abengoa Bioenergy, ALICO, BlueFire Ethanol, Broin, Iogen, and Range Fuels.
  • Read the DOE Press Release.

2006

• U.S. sees delay in big rise in alternative motor fuels, 20 September 2006, Reuters, reported that the U.S. DOE stated that goal of having alternative fuels meet 30 percent of fuel needs for cars and trucks will not be met by the mandated year of 2010, but will require an additional 20 years.
  • "New ethanol plants are coming online, but output would have to soar to 60 billion gallons a year by 2010 to replace 30 percent of petroleum-based motor fuel supplies, the DOE said."
  • "That would not be possible, according to the department, because all the corn currently grown by U.S. farmers could make just 18 billion gallons of ethanol a year."
  • "The department said achieving the 30 percent replacement fuel requirement also becomes more difficult each year because more vehicles are put on the road and vehicle miles traveled increase."[17]