Sen. Brown announces $5.7M biomass grant

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U.S. Senator Sherrod Brown (D-Avon)

Staff report

WASHINGTON

U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, has announced a $5.7 million award from the U.S. Department of Agriculture that will create as many as 1,210 new jobs by allowing Northeast Ohio farmers to grow miscanthus giganteus, a clean-energy biomass.

Farmers in a 5,400-acre, seven-county area in Northeast Ohio and western Pennsylvania, including Trumbull County, can receive funds to grow miscanthus giganteus, a grass, which Aloterra Energy in Conneaut, Pa., will turn into biofuels.

The $5.7 million funding will be awarded through USDA’s Biomass Crop Assistance Program.

Farmers will enter into a contract with Aloterra to plant miscanthus. Aloterra will buy miscanthus and convert it into pellets before selling it to be used as a source of clean energy.

The farmer will have three sources of income: tonnage payments, carbon credits and profit sharing from the conversion facility. Farmers also will earn BCAP rent payments on acres planted and receive $45 per ton harvested for two years.

“This is the beginning of a new opportunity to diversify income,” said U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.