I guess the “Empty Quarter” (see Colors of Elk Country post) will be empty of biofuel research.
Cathie Wotecki is the Undersecretary for the Research Education and Economics area at USDA.
Here’s the link to the story.
The USDA says five regional biofuels research centers would be created. The centers, a collaboration between the Agricultural Research Service (ARS) and the U.S. Forest Service (FS), would be established at:
* Northeast Center — Madison, Wis., led by the Forest Service
* Central East Center — UNL, led by ARS
* Southeast Center – Boonesville, Ark., and Tifton, Ga., (both ARS) and in Auburn, Ala. (FS)
* Western Center — Maricopa, Ariz.
* Northwestern Center — Pullman, Wash., (ARS) and Corvallis, Ore. (FS)
Funds are also to be made available to assist in the construction of new biorefineries, starting in 2011. One refinery would be built in each of the regions serviced by the new biomass research centers, but no locations were announced.
OK, I guess Pullman counts as Elk Country, but associated with Oregon State and called “Northwest” not so sure that the east side will get attention… also Maricopa may not quite be Elk Country.
The photo is of Maricopa, Arizona. Disclaimer: I once worked in the REE mission area for an agency then known as CSREES and now known as NIFA.
Must…preserve….sacred….dead….lodgepole…….forests.
I also see that California National Forests might be out of the loop as well, as some people still want the original Sierra Nevada Framework (and its very low diameter limits) to be the law of the land again. Several of SPI’s state of the art small log mills are shuttered, and biomass won’t be happening out here on the pseudo-progressive left coast.
Then, there’s always the specter of Chad Hanson, now pushing to eliminate timber sales on private lands, as well as on Federal lands (to “save” the black-backed woodpecker). Yes, he outright says that thinning and salvage projects MUST end, throughout California. Ummmm, Chad, early explorers didn’t find seas of snag patches, here.
Foto- For research funding, I don’t think it’s that kind of thing. More that Elk Country universities either didn’t compete or didn’t compete well, for some reason.
It’s just interesting to me that the regions include North Central and South EAST, Northwest and I guess everything from Prairies to California are “West”.
So here’s another effort the DOI Climate Change Science Centers- what they have in common is that the Interior West is not a region- it is a piece of three regions. Of course it might be nice if we standardized “regions” across different efforts and agencies, but..