Charlie Cushwa: Basically, the project started at Virginia
Tech, with Conservation Management Institute, back in 2005.
Jeff Walden had the idea, and we began looking at the opportunity to develop switchgrass
as a biofuel for use in the state of Virginia.
Our ultimate goal was to get about 50,000 acres of grass planted primarily to enhance
quail habitat.
Jeff Waldon: The thing that I like about we've been doing
here at Burkeville, is... it's a combined project that addresses the need for the hospital
there to reduce their costs, reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, to address some
of the sustainability goals that they've got.
But then also to push more money out in the community, which they have done.
Charlie Cushwa: The fuel is fantastic.
The statistics that we see off the fuel BTU values, steam output per ton, and this, is
phenomenal.
Greater than we ever expected...
than was ever shown in the literature.
This project would be absolutely nowhere if it were not Piedmont Hospital, if it were
not for Nottoway County and those people, and the Tobacco Commission and also FDC and
the landowners.
And so, it's truly a cooperative farm-to-fuel project, without any piece, it would not exist.
Lynne Inge: With the fuel oil, the cost fluctuated so
much, I would not know from year-to-year depending on what the weather was, how much I was going
to spend.
By using a more consistent, cost-based fuel source - the native warm season grass - I've
been able to budget more consistently and know what my expenses were going to be from
one year to the next.
Steve Bowen: Sawdust is 40 to 50% water.
Switchgrass is under 15% moisture.
The way switchgrass became very competitive with sawdust in the wintertime, is because
of that moisture.
You can't burn water.
During January of 2011 through February we had a 44 days successful burn.
In the 44 day period, FDC actually put in our economy between 200 to 250,000 dollars.
They stay in hotels, they ate in Nottoway County in Blackstone, Virginia, they was burning
fuel.
When their tractors broke down they were buying materials here.
Not only did FDC put money back into our community, instead of burning oil in those 44 days, we
saved $44,000 in those 44 days for the Commonwealth of Virginia.
Fred Circle: What we're really talking about is that there's
multi-stakeholders and everyone gets a benefit out of it.
For landowners it's a new revenue stream.
It's putting land cover on the ground that captures carbon, which is good for everybody.
It reduces sedimentation into the streams that are adjacent, which is good for water
quality for everybody.
We have a ten-year contract, so it's locked in fixed-price revenue that's coming into
them that they can count on.
They can pay their taxes, put some money in the bank, and be able to sustain that heritage
that that land owner family may have on that piece of land.
John Prosise: Nottoway Biofuels has offered landowners and
farmers another avenue for their unused agricultural land without substituting productive farmland.
It has provided a renewable green energy and it has helped one of our largest employers
in the county with their fuel costs.
And because that employer is also state agency, it helps us all as taxpayers.
Stephanie Pechura: To see both facilities succeed and grow and
if not grow sustain, and still provide service at cost to the taxpayers of Virginia that
they can accept, and if they see a program that is not only giving back in other ways,
then that protects this campus.
And the jobs in this community, and the local growers that are growing the switchgrass.
That's a win for everyone.
Celia Orr-Elzay: Certainly the biofuels focus and environmental
advantages of that was a start.
And it is still evolving, but the idea that it would be something that could be usefully
grown here in Southside Virginia and be productive crop, where other crops like tobacco were
no longer viable.
Steve Bowen: When we first went into this endeavor with
FDC, I had to think about the changes that went on in my life from a person what was
born in the 60s.
When we were growing up we didn't wear seatbelts, and then my children come along and they said,
"Daddy you need to put your seatbelt on."
And later on, they started recycling, and I thought, "I'm not putting all those aluminum
cans and taking them somewhere", and they said, "But you're saving the earth."
And they changed - my children, I now have a granddaughter whose four years old - has
changed my way of thinking of how we need to take care of our world and for the generations
to come.
And so, that really affected me of saying, you know, when we started thinking about burning
switchgrass, I thought, "Maybe this is something we need to try, at least try, and see what
will happen.
What's the worst thing could happen?
The worst thing could happen, it wouldn't work.
But it did work, and we made it work.
And we need to figure out how to make things work in the future, so these young people
can have the environment, can have the pleasure of going outdoors, and seeing a pond that's
not polluted, a field that's not polluted, and so they can share with their children
as I grew up with, and we owe that to the next generation.