In late October, the Biofuels Center hosted a meeting of the North Carolina Working Lands Group. The Working Lands Group is a collaboration among a number of state agencies, military institutions, and non-governmental  organizations. The mission of the collaboration is to preserve and enhance farms, forests, and other working lands for the mutual gain of conservation of natural resources, increased economic benefits for landowners, and the protection of military training needs.

The Center participates in the collaboration because its efforts to develop new biomass markets and promote farm and forest land retention are central to meeting the state’s biofuels policy goal. Some of the other organizations represented at the October meeting were the N.C. Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, the N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources, the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission, N.C. Farm Bureau, Environmental Defense Fund, the Fort Bragg Regional Alliance, and representatives from the Marine Corps Installations East.

During the meeting the group heard presentations on the work of the Center, including its Eastern Biofuels project, which is focused on producing biofuels to serve North Carolina’s military bases. The group concluded its meeting with a tour of the Center’s demonstration trials of biofuels feedstock crops, including Switchgrass, Giant Miscanthus, and Eastern Cottonwood trees.