Biomass Crop Assistance Program rules still some months away

Washington Ag Today June 18, 2010 It has been over two years since the 2008 Farm Bill became law. Within the new bill was the Biomass Crop Assistance Program, or BCAP, which was designed to help producers establish new biomass crops or get them to biofuel facilities. But BCAP still does not have final rules in place.

Coppess: “We are in the final stretch if you will but certainly have quite a bit of work to do.”

Jonathan Coppess Administrator of the Farm Service Agency. He says a proposed rule was put out for public comment and USDA is now in the process of developing a final rule and also completing an Environmental Impact Statement. That should all be ready by this fall but then Congress has sixty days to comment.

Coppess explains what BCAP will do once it is implemented.

Coppess: “One provision is an assistance for establishment, which is essentially the federal government will reimburse a farmer up to 75% of the cost to establish a new crop. The other part of the program is a matching payment program for the collection, harvest, storage and transportation of biomass. Any biomass from anywhere so long as it is eligible material as defined in the statute and the regs. Moving that biomass from the field to a biomass facility that will convert it into energy or biofuels.”

Not biomass but biofuel crops will be discussed at several Washington State University field days throughout the summer in both eastern and western Washington. Researchers will talk about work on canola, camelina, mustard and safflower.

I’m Bob Hoff and that’s Washington Ag Today on Northwest Aginfo Net.