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Audio Script:
Intro:
The Leona (lee-OH-nuh) community in Leon County anticipates some growing pains as its local economy faces potential change. Bill McLean reports, this is rural economic development in action.
McLean:
In 1995, a local landowner walked into the local Natural Resources Conservation Office asking for advice about some conservation ideas he hand in mind. Conservation Specialist Floyd Nauls wanted to see what the landowner had in mind.
Nauls:
:06 - I went out and we discussed it, and I could tell it was something larger than I ever anticipated.
McLean:
Nauls says he made a few introductions for the landowner that eventually resulted in the June groundbreaking of the first cellulose biogas plant in the U.S. Based on designs of facilities in Germany, the biogas plant will basically do what a cow does, except using machines instead of a digestive tract... that is, ingest hybrid forage sorghum, belch and flatulate methane, which is then burned to produce electricity. The facility would require more than 17,000 tons of sorghum each year, and Nauls says area cattle operators are being invited to consider growing part of that crop.
Nauls:
:11 - Especially like a lot of abandoned land that was in farming in times past, and currently is sitting idle. That would be a prime candidate to actually produce some money off of that land.
McLean:
Nauls and his NRCS colleagues say this plant could provide electricity for 400 homes a year, prompting ideas for similar plants in Central Texas. Nauls says this facility's success, and potentially other future facilities, will change the local economy and provide hundreds, if not thousands, of jobs.
