US DOE backs 6 bioenergy R&D projects with USD 30m

Sorghum. Author: Cyndy Sims Parr. License: Creative Commons, Attribution 2.0 Generic.

The US Department of Energy (DOE) said Thursday it has awarded USD 30 million (EUR 26.4m) in funds to six projects that aim to speed up energy crop development for the production of biofuels.

The money comes under the Transportation Energy Resources from Renewable Agriculture (TERRA) programme whose goal is to combine agriculture, information technology and engineering to address challenges in developing crops that are sustainable, affordable and yield abundant plant feedstocks for bioenergy.

Details on the six winning projects are available in the table and here.

Amount	Awardee	Project
USD 6m	Clemson University	Breeding High Yielding Bioenergy Sorghum
USD 8m	Donald Danforth Plant Science Center	Reference Phenotyping System for Energy Sorghum
USD 3.3m	Pacific Northwest National Laboratory	Consortium for Advanced Sorghum Phenomics
USD 6.5m	Purdue University	Automated Sorghum Phenotyping and Trait Development Platform
USD 3.1m	Texas A&M AgriLife Research	Automated Phenotyping System for Genetic Improvement of Energy Crops
USD 3.1m	University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign	Mobile Energy-Crop Phenotyping Platform

The DOE also said yesterday it will provide USD 25 million in funds for 12 projects under the GENerators for Small Electrical and Thermal Systems (GENSETS) programme. GENSETS aims to accelerate the development of generator technologies for more affordable and efficient residential combined heat and power (CHP) systems.

(USD 1 = EUR 0.881)

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