Biofuel Bonanza

Breaking America's oil addiction will take extraordinary leadership and new sources of energy. That's good news for North Carolina: "The Saudi Arabia of biomass."

By David Hunt

Record oil prices and the environmental threat from greenhouse gases have stirred efforts across the nation to develop a practical, renewable energy source to fuel the 2.7 trillion miles traveled by American drivers every year. The 2005 energy bill mandates that 7.5 billion gallons of biofuel be in use by 2012, and President Bush recently proposed increasing that amount nearly fivefold to 35 billion gallons by 2017.

That sounds good on paper except for one question: how will we produce all that biofuel?

Researchers at North Carolina State University have been working on the answer, and they say it could mean big changes (and big opportunities) for North Carolina.

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