Statewide Iowa — An 80-million dollar USDA grant will provide new incentives to farmers in Iowa and Missouri who switch from planting corn and soybeans on marginal cropland — and grow native grasses and prairie plants to harvest instead.
Roeslein Alternative Energy of St. Louis, Missouri, secured the grant with help from Iowa State University and the Iowa Soybean Association. Roeslein spokesman Brandon Butler says the company, which started in 2012, has been capturing energy from livestock waste.
The new initiative plans to make renewable natural gas from the plant material harvested from local fields.
Butler says this new project also fits with the company’s mission.
The five-year pilot project will compensate farmers for growing restored grasses and prairie plants, which have deep roots that store carbon in the soil. The harvested biomass will be combined with manure in facilities that ultimately produce renewable natural gas.
