The goal of the Willow BioEnergy Project is to research, develop and commercialize willow biomass as a locally grown, renewable resource fuel to be co-fired with coal in electric power plants. The US Department of Energy, USDA, and NYS Energy Research and Development Association has provided funding. Research continues in the areas of carbon sequestration, avian and microarthropod biodiversity, phytoremediation, crop development and production, herbicide application, pest and disease resistance, planting and harvesting methods and integrative technologies.
Farmers have an important contribution to make to further the research being done by academia.
The project has reached many milestones. 300 acres of willow have been planted, with an additional 300 acres prepared for planting in the spring of 2000. Specialized planting machinery has been modified to fit local conditions, retrofits have been made at the power plant to allow handling and co-firing of woody biomass, and public awareness of the project and of the benefits of biomass has been increased. This project provides a model for new partnerships between research universities, industry, government agencies and natural resource conservation non-profits. The willow biomass enterprise is being developed on a foundation of careful and extensive research.