Funding center a good bet

By David Fleischaker

Published: May 31, 2008

After funding the Oklahoma Bioenergy Center last year with $10 million, the Legislature was poised to zero out second-year funding. Sticking to his guns, Gov. Brad Henry struck a deal with the Legislature to fund the OBC at $4 million for next year. It's a good bet.

Oklahoma is poised to take the leadership in producing a crop that doesn't compete with food, and grows naturally in Oklahoma and much of the Plains states. These crops are the perennial prairie grasses, the most common is switchgrass. They are the acknowledged candidates to lead our country into the next generation of biofuels.

Biofuels and particularly the ethanol made from corn have gotten a bad rap lately. They're blamed for rising food costs, causing worldwide starvation and environmental disasters such as burning the rain forests to make room for biofuels crops. Much of what we hear is exaggeration. Rising energy costs, which increase fertilizer and transportation costs, drought that has decimated rice and wheat production worldwide, and the increase in demand for cattle feed as the 1.9 billion Chinese eat increasing amounts of meat as their standards of living improves, are more the culprits for increased food costs and worldwide starvation.

But we needn't defend the corn industry. The OBC is perfecting a crop that won't compete for food. In addition, we will extract far more energy from it than is required to produce it, because it's perennial, drought resistant and requires lesser amounts of fertilizer,

As scientific opinion begins to turn on corn and other candidates that are not indigenous and risk taking over our plant environment, our candidate, the perennial prairie grasses, is "the last and best man standing.”

Like cream, the OBC's efforts have risen to the top. In one short year of existence, the OBC established partnerships with the Idaho National Laboratory and the Oakridge National Laboratory; a partnership with the second-largest producer of ethanol in the world; and a world-first, 1,000-acre farm that will produce switchgrass and will attract the large farm machinery manufacturers like John Deere and Caterpillar to test new harvest equipment. We also are establishing a research partnership with one of the leading Chinese universities.

The implications of all this for Oklahoma's future are extraordinary. We've got a winning hand, let's play it.

Fleischaker is Oklahoma's energy secretary.

Comments