On March 14, the House Ways & Means Committee’s Subcommittee on Tax Policy held a hearing titled: Post Tax Reform Evaluation of Recently Expired Tax Provisions. The hearing featured four separate panels to provide a forum for sector representatives to discuss and defend the need for continuing targeted tax provisions also known as “tax extenders.” The budget

It was anticipated that the House Agriculture Committee would release a Chairman’s mark of a 5 year farm bill authorization this week, but it now appears that a proposal will not surface until after the Easter recess.  BTEC continues to remain optimistic that the Community Wood Energy Program (CWEP) will be expanded in scope and receive

The American National Standards Institute (ANSI) has approved the AD17225-4 Wood Chip Heating Fuel Quality Standard. The standard was developed by the Biomass Energy Resource Center, the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers, Innovative Natural Resource Solutions LLC, and BTEC, with funding from the Forest Service. The Wood Chip Standard is the first quality

The process to develop a U.S. Wood Chip Heating Fuel Technical Quality Standard is cruising toward completion and moving into the implementation phase. You may recall that BTEC is a member of the project advisory committee tasked with the development of a wood chip standard suitable for US thermal applications. The two year project is under the

On February 9, Congress passed and President Trump signed the Budget Act of 2018 into law. Included in the package was a package of tax extensions that BTEC had identified as a vehicle for enacting the BTU Act. Unfortunately, despite strong support in the Senate, the BTU Act tax credit was not included in the

On February 13, EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt met with New Hampshire Governor Sununu and members of the forest industry.  At the meeting, Pruitt announced plans implement a Congressional directive BTEC helped create to treat forest based biomass energy as carbon neutral. Charlie Niebling of Innovative Natural Resource Solutions, LLC, and BTEC Board Director, attended the event with

On January 22, BTEC submitted a proposal to the U.S. Forest Service Wood Innovation Grant. BTEC’s $250,000 proposal aims to reduce the barriers to wood energy adoption and utilization by building bridges and mainstreaming wood energy technologies in the engineering, HVAC and high-performance building sectors. BTEC’s proposal outlined a number of projects that would accomplish

BTEC continues to work the House and Senate to advance a more robust Community Wood Energy Program (CWEP) in the next Farm Bill.  We have led and participated in dozens of meeting over the last few weeks to build support for $250 million in mandatory funding for CWEP which would be paired with a broadened scope

The current measure funding the government expires at the end of this week (January 19) which has set the table for a hectic, albeit shortened, week with yesterday being a federal holiday.  Negotiations continue on the contents of the next short term Continuing Resolution which is expected to extend federal funding well into February.  This next CR