The most significant opportunity to help offset the need for imported oil is the use of alternative feedstocks that can be derived from renewable plants and crops. Renewable materials, from American-grown crops can provide many of the same basic, chemical building blocks as petrochemicals, and can provide others that petrochemicals cannot. The carbon contained in 900 million barrels of oil can be produced from renewable feedstocks on about 80 million acres of land, about equal to current corn production. Using historical, average prices for corn and oil, the cost of carbon from corn approaches the cost of carbon from oil. To achieve the bold vision, we must begin laying the research foundation today.
New technologies require time to develop and implement.
Now is the time for significant research and development on what renewable sources and novel processes might be available, and for beginning to develop selection criteria among the possible alternatives. After the Agricultural Vision was unveiled in 1998, work on a technology roadmap began. Inputs were gathered from two workshops with scientific and marketing experts from a broad range of disciplines. The Technology Roadmap, published in February 1999, identifies performance goals and establishes a focused research and development agenda for developing the technologies needed to make the industry vision a reality. The Roadmap identified research needs in four major research categories.