Grainnet

2007 Sun Grant Initiative Awards Announced to Five Regional Institutions for Biofuels Research

The 2007 Sun Grant Initiative (SGI) Awards were announced this summer, awarded at five regional instititions.

The Safe, Accountable, Flexible, Efficient, Transportation Equity Act: A Legacy for Users (SAFETEA-LU, Public Law 109-59), enacted in 2005, authorized funding for each of fiscal years 2006 through 2009, to carry out biobased research of national importance [Section 5201(m)].

This legislation provides funding from the Department of Transportation (DOT) to each of the five regional Sun Grant Initiative (SGI) Centers.

The SGI Centers have developed a scope of work to address DOT biobased transportation research priorities, through a mixture of national, regional, and Center lead projects.

Seventy-five percent of the funds received by the SGI Centers are allocated through regional competitive grants programs.

Regional Competitive Grants

Each of the five SGI Centers managed its own regional competitive grants program, to best meet the challenges of bioenergy and biomass research and education needs within their respective regions.

As part of the development of the Regional Competitive Grants Program, each of the SGI Centers developed a solicitation for their region, consistent with national priorities identified by an ad hoc federal agency panel led by DOT/RITA with representatives from DOE, USDA, EPA and DOD.

These national priorities for renewable transportation fuel development included: biofuel feedstock development; biofuels conversion processes; biofuel system analysis; economics, marketing and policy; and, environmental impacts.

These national priorities were considered in the context of the unique biomass and biomass resources and challenges within each of the regions. Each of the five regional Sun Grant Initiative Centers announced its regional competitive grants program in a Request for Applications (RFA) released in later February through early March of 2007.

Each region developed peer review panels with representatives from academia as well as specialists from national laboratories and federal agencies with appropriate subject matter expertise.

Projects were selected on the basis of scientific merit, novelty, probability of success, timeframe for results, and priority for the region.

With a more diverse biomass resource base, the Western and North Eastern region funded a larger number of smaller “start-up” and exploratory grants.

All of the regions completed their award process by the summer of 2007.

Awards

A summary report from each of the five regions follows.

These reports describe in more detail each regions grant award process, the number and characteristics of the grants selected, and the importance of these grants to the respective regions.

Across the five regions, over 300 proposals were received with requests for funding of about $70 million.

For more information, call 888-454-6264.

Links to Grants From the Five Regions