By Denise Ross

Before I get to some of the details from Monday’s field hearing in Rapid City, let’s ponder something that none of use could have imagined back in 2002 — that a Sen. John Thune and a Sen. Tim Johnson would sit side-by-side working on an issue together. That’s what happened at South Dakota School of Mines & Technology in Rapid City.

(Photos by Denise)

Forgive my poor photo editing, but I did not get a photo in which they both looked good, so I cropped 2 shots. Mr. Hoghouse, my staff photographer, had to report to his paying job on Monday so I was on my own.

As you can read from the background panel, the field hearing was about “transforming forest waste to biofuels,” which does seem like a common sense thing to do. I did not attend the entire hearing, but while I was there I heard no objections to the idea.

It means literally transforming those slash piles of branches that populate the Black Hills National Forest and turning them into ethanol we can power our vehicles on. What could be wrong with that? Somebody powerful objected to it when Congress passed an energy bill because provisions to include forest waste - slash, wood chips, saw dust - in the renewable fuels standard got stripped from the bill in that mysterious Capitol Hill triangle where laws get written but nobody knows who did it or how.

When Democratic state Sen. Tom Katus asked Thune which “forces in the dark of night” removed the provision from the energy bill, Thune put the blame at the feet of “House leadership,” then named House Speaker Nancy Pelosi specifically. Interesting. Thune also called the whole thing “very regrettable,”  but he said it with an edge that made it sound more like, “pitifully embarrassing.”

On the upside, Thune said a commercailly viable cellulosic ethanol industry would spell lots of economic development for the Black Hills. “I don’t think that’s very far away,” he said. “That is the next generation of biofuels that will bet us away from this food vs. fuel debate.” He then called that particular debate “a whole lot of misinformation.”

The hearing was held in the crackerbarrel room and drew a respectable crowd, though not the standing room only crowd that shows up when state lawmakers are there during the legislative session.

Back to those slash piles, there are about 5,000 of them in the forest at any given time, the senators were told. The Forest Service are working to quantify exactly how much cellulosic ethanol that would produce. There is, Thune said, 105 gallons of cellulosic ethanol per ton of biomass.

Find a rundown of more numbers below, plus a list of other political figures at the hearing.

BHNF chief Craig Bobzien, left, and Tom Troxel of the Black Hills Forest Resource Association, testified Monday.

Some of the numbers below were gleaned from the testimony.

• 200 railroad cars, each full of 100 tons of forest waste, leave the Black Hills each month headed for a plant in Washington state.
• About 2,000 tons of forest waste would be “readily retreivable” from the BHNF under the current forest management plan.
• Using forest waste to create cellulosic ethanol could create as many as 40,000 jobs across the country; a whole lot of those could be in the Black Hills.
• There could be between 207,000 and 1.2 million tons of forest waste coming out of the Black Hills - public and private land - should a cellulosic ethanol industry ramp up here.

Also in the crowd Monday were, pictured below, Johnson campaign manager Steve Jarding and Johnson’s wife, Barb.

Others whom I did not photograph include state Reps. Jeff Haverly and Ed McLaughlin and state Sen. Dennis Schmidt, all Republicans; Democratic state House candidate Jeff Nelsen and Lois Facer, wife to Dem House candidate Eric Abrahamson.

Spread the word

Hide Sites