This page of our web site is dedicated to “Brain Food” – book reviews, blog pieces, magazine articles or important new Council documents on subjects which concern us. The page is permanently dedicated to the three men from the Photo Gallery: Don Post, Gordon Prine and Alex Green, all Brain Powers in this State in their hay-day and Emeritus Professors from 3 different Departments at UFL. 

     This month (August, 2011) we post an Op Ed in the Gainesville Sun written by friend and colleague Richard Schroeder of Bioresource Management. The GREC (100 MW of bio-electricity approved by the City of Gainesville Commission) has begun construction following several delays. Richard answers the question “Is there enough biomass for the GREC” in an authoritative manner. The credit goes to many players for making this new business happen. The Council played a key role in the long process beginning in 1997 when it organized an “Expert Panel” for a City/County Commission presentation. At that meeting was the newly elected City Commissioner Pegeen Hanrahan. She listened carefully and understood what was being said. By 2003 GRU announced that they were concerned about the price of fossil fuels both gasious and solid and began a series of community meetings to elicit ideas. Council members Don Post and Tom Cunilio offered to conduct a brief study of the waste wood in a 25-mile radius around Deerhaven. That effort, titled ”Biomass Options for GRU, Part II,” showed that there were 60 MWs worth of energy in waste wood alone from the 3 major sources – urban tree debris, logging debris and land-clearing debris. The astute commissioner Hanrahan and Strategic Planning Director at GRU, Ed Regan, had the ammunition they needed to proceed.

     Now Richard tells us that 40% of the energy for the GREC will be from urban tree debris and that this is not unprecedented in Florida. Richard worked with the Council when we studied recommissioning a small wood fired power plant at Raiford for which we received $15K from the Division of Forestry in 2005. He knows his stuff and we applaud his team effort in getting this project done – thanks to a $500 million set of loan guarantees from banks around the world. Will rate payers become overburdened by future rates increasing? We think not. GRU strategists had the best interests of the city in mind recommending  an agreement with American Renewables which kept us, the City of Gainesville, out of debt. It was prescient.

     The challenge for the Council will be to now develop a business plan to acquire rights to the wood ash. We propose that it be returned to the land for its high potassium value. Potassium fertilize now costs about $600/ton and legume growers use a lot of it as well as hay producers. More later on this but if you click here you can read R. Schroeder’s piece in the Sun.