Associated Research

Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation (CABBI), led by the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. CABBI is integrating recent advances in agronomics, genomics, biosystems design, and computational biology to increase the value of energy crops, using a “plants as factories” approach to grow fuels and chemicals in plant stems and an automated foundry to convert biomass into valuable chemicals that are ecologically and economically sustainable.

Center for Bioenergy Innovation (CBI), led by Oak Ridge National Laboratory. CBI is accelerating the domestication of bioenergy-relevant plants and microbes to enable high-impact, value-added coproduct development at multiple points in the bioenergy supply chain.

Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC), led by the University of Wisconsin—Madison in partnership with Michigan State University. GLBRC is developing the science and technological advances to ensure sustainability at each step in the process of creating biofuels and bioproducts from lignocellulose.

Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI), led by DOE’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. JBEI is using the latest tools in molecular biology, chemical engineering, and computational and robotics technologies to transform biomass into biofuels and bioproducts.

The Western Biomass Research Center, based in Maricopa, AZ, works with the Central-East and Northwestern centers on the genetic improvement of oilseed crop yield and enhancing biomass production.

The Northwestern Biomass Research Center, based in Sidney, MT, is mainly focused on work on oilseed crops with the potential to meet the immediate feedstock needs of the U.S. military and aviation industry for jet and marine fuels.

The Central-East Biomass Research Center, based in Lincoln, NE, focuses on the genetic development and sustainable production of switchgrass and perennial grasses, corn stover, and other crop residues for cellulosic biomass feedstocks. This region produces a significant amount of the corn used for ethanol production, and its challenges in dedicated feedstock production is to integrate biomass production into existing agricultural landscapes in ways that enhance soil and water quality.

The Southeastern Biomass Research Center, based in Tifton, GA, focuses on semitropical perennial grasses such as sugar cane, Napier grass, and biomass sorghum, which can be harvested for sugar- and cellulose-based biorefinery feedstocks. The Southeast is expected to supply nearly half of the required feedstock to supply advanced biofuel to meet the RFS2 goals by 2022.