Bio-fuels

=//** Bio-fuels **//=

= = Bio-fuels in the research triangle and elsewhere in North Carolina are a budding industry with the full support of the state government, which provides some grants amounting up to five million annually. With a field comprised of multiple branches, including the research, production, and marketing of bio-fuels. The basic concept of bio-fuels as an alternative to conventional fossil fuels has been around for a great deal of time;but the importance of alternative fuels is growing.North Carolina has risen steadily in coal and liquid fuel consumption over the past few decades with out growing population and tendencies for urban sprawl leading to greater wasteful driving and a dirth of commonly used public transportation. On a good note, North Carolina is ranked as one of the top ten states in ethanol use, an industry with a great deal of support within the state as a possible supplement to existing fossil fuels. North Carolina has set out a road map initiated in 2007 with the goal of having 10% of fuels consumed in North Carolina being locally grown and processed bio-fuels. With investments coming in some cases from overseas with joint ventures to further research into technologies and the sustainability of bio-fuel production in a localized economy. Outside entities include HCL Clean, a joint Israeli-U.S. company specializing in the technology necessary to create a pilot plant to begin bio-fuel production. Some of North Carolina's incentives offered to incoming corporate enterprises are tax credits equivalent to 15% of their facility construction costs and an exemption of sales tax for bio-fuels manufactured within the state. Additional tax incentives are offered for those who modify soybean production to create bio-diesel, as well as further tax credits to land owners who lease their land for renewable energy producing crops. The leased land is then used for either currently used bio-fuel crops such as corn or soybeans or in trail run crops for research including the 15 foot tall giant miscanthus grass or other fast growing cotton weeds. By using crops with shorter growing times and greater ethanol producing qualities the amount of arable land consumed for energy production can be minimized and give greater production value to whatever land can be used at those times. The organization of Bio-fuel efforts within the state of North Carolina is performed by the Biofuels Center of North Carolina(which has a more extensive write up in another page of the Wiki) based in Oxford North Carolina. Within the Biofuels Center partnerships with research labs and farmers are made and crops are trail run and sold into further production. With branches delving into the education of both scientists and field professionals in green energy and in the creation of natural feedstock for animals raised in rural North Carolina. The activities of the Biofuels Center is all made possible by the availability of educated and unionized labor within North Carolina along with well laid out infrastructure and an accepting market climate. The market climate of North Carolina is represented not only with our liquid fuel consumption but with the infrastructure through the state, namely the number of biodiesel pumps in necessary locations along with a strong base for B100 bio-fuels(pure biodiesel blends).North Carolina has arguably the greatest concentration in the United States for such bio-fuel consumption and local production. There exist companies within North Carolina that specialize in the distribution of biodiesel in varying quantities for prices that strive to make them competitive with their fossil counterparts. One of such organizations is Carolina Biodiesel, an establishment that uses 2,500 gallon trucks to distribute biodiesel to fueling stations throughout the triangle. It isn’t just small exploratory companies getting involved either, with energy giants such as Exxon Mobil and BP beginning to use some of their preexisting establishments to transport and retail bio-fuels in varying mixes with their current petroleum based products. Plans for pipelines, the most efficient method of fuel transportation, have been in the works for the last decade but have been made difficult due to a lack of consistent and stationary demand for the renewable fuels and in some cases the corrosive nature of the fuel. biodiesel holds a strong following in North Carolina with the NCBA (can you guess what that stands for?) helping to handle logistics costs for the transportation and sale of their product throughout North Carolina. With a much longer history than ethanol in the commercial fuel economy and the ability to be mixed in part with regular diesel and remain “bio” (by federal regulation) the production and consumption of biodiesel remains a more stable enterprise within North Carolina. On the flip-side of this argument, ethanol is already used in a blend with our in use out of the pump fuel, making its consumption much less of a conscious choice than its side effect prone counterpart.