Harding Speaks on Renewable Energy at Biennial Briefing of Georgia Legislators

The following is an excerpt from the Athens Banner-Herald full article.

Energy now may come to the forefront as lawmakers look for the right formula to cut pollution and switch from coal to homegrown, renewable energy sources while keeping rates reasonable.

At the energy panel and another Monday discussion on technology, experts touted a method of converting pine trees into fuel pioneered by scientists at Georgia Tech as a clean source of cheap energy that will create thousands of new jobs.

It will do for Georgia, the state with the largest privately owned forests, what ethanol did for Iowa corn growers, said Ross Harding, Managing Partner and founder of Energy Launch Partners LLC, a renewable energy firm.

“This is on a scale we’ve never seen before,” Harding said.

Fuel in the Pines, Georgia’s Bright Future in Bioenergy

Bioenergy experts are predicting that Georgia will play a leading role in the research and production of biofuels in the 21st century. And, Ross Harding, Managing Partner and founder of Energy Launch Partners LLC, predicts Georgia will be able to produce 20 percent of its fuel needs – about 1.6 billion gallons of ethanol a year – from forest resources.

The following is an excerpt from the Georgia Trend full article:

Georgia has mass quantities of biomass.  The 24 million acres of commercial forest (second only to Oregon) are just the beginning. There is copious farmland to grow crops for fuel or food or both; tons of wood debris, paper pulp, grass; about a billion pounds of chicken fat and grease from the poultry processing industry (a key biodiesel feedstock), and at least one power plant producing electricity from chicken litter.