Tennessee’s Governor lashes at legislators over ‘ridiculous’ biofuels flap: “They may have single-handedly cost an awful lot of jobs.”
In Tennessee, a controversy blew up in the Legislature over a contention that legislators were not advised that a Dupont Danisco project, which received $70 million in state support, had changed its short-term feedstock strategy to corn cobs, from switchgrass, and had reduced its capacity from 5 million to 250,000 gallons.
At the same time, Governor Phil Bredesen alluded to a “major biofuels investment” that is possible for Tennessee, or at least one other state, that will be announced “before the end of the year.”
State Rep. Curry Todd told WSMV that “It looks like we’ve been sold a bill of goods down here in the General Assembly on this plant.”
Governor Phil Bredesen said in an interview yesterday: “I think the behaviour of the executive director of the fiscal review committee was outrageous. But I can’t recall in any administration that kind of sandbagging taking place by an executive director. Some of the accusations – the change in the contracting party and nobody knew about it – and the output of the plant and nobody knew about it – are just ridiculous. I went back and those things all went through the Buidling Commission – they were all discussed.
“The Building Commission is a public body which reporters and members of the legislature are perfectly welcome to attend . When it comes to changing the contract, I remember holding a press conference on it – this was all a year ago, more than a year ago.
“So to come in and act like you’ve discovered a great secret about the biofuels project and you’re going to act as a prosecutor in front of this committee I think is very, very poor behavior. And I hope that the chair and the vice-chair of that committee can get this thing straightened out.
“The reason I am irritated – more than irritated – mad about it – we have been getting very close to announcing a large investment in east Tennessee, in biofuels, driven by the presence of this project, by the end of the year. I emphasize a very large investment. We are scrambling like mad today to keep this together because – their reaction to this stuff – and we got this out of another state they were going to – if the legislatiure is going to politicize this stuff in this ridiculous way, I don’t want to play in that game and I am going to look at going somewhere else.
“And they may have single handedly cost an awful lot of jobs. I am working on it, and I am hope to pull this back together but it is a real problem today.”
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Joelle Brink | Nov 6, 2009 | Reply
I am puzzled by Governor Bredesen’s complaint. The DuPont Danisco plant is a newly constructed pilot plant that is in its early startup stage. Corn cobs are often used as the initial feedstock for new cellulosic plants because the cellulosic process for corn cobs is already well understood.
Thirty-eight new farmers were accepted into UT’s switchgrass program this year in order to increase switchgrass production and test the crop on a wide range of soils.
Barring some new revelation of which the governor alone is aware, I must assume that this is simply a misunderstanding.