Achievement

An important yet unaddressed question is under what contractual or pricing arrangements farmers will grow biomass for bioenergy in these nascent markets. IGERT trainees have examined farmers’ willingness to produce corn stover, sweet sorghum, and switchgrass as bioenergy crops under alternative contractual, pricing, and harvesting arrangements. Results show that farmers are most willing to produce annual energy crops and least willing to produce perennial energy crops due to uncertainty and long contracts. A predicted price of $35/dry ton above the price expected from conventional crops would be required to realized significant farmer participation in bioenergy markets. These results will facilitate contract designs while informing policymakers about farmers’ willingness to supply biomass to biofuels facilities. This work has resulted in seven presentations and two conference publications authored by IGERT trainees and mentors with several publications in preparation.