One of the most-pressing issues facing the United States is use of energy; and questions about how to power homes, appliances and cars are common.

North Carolina is one area where these issues are playing out.

W. Steven Burke, president and CEO of the Biofuels Center of North Carolina, spoke about the influence of ethanol on North Carolina’s economy in a recent interview with the Washington Daily News. Burke gave some context about the first ethanol plant in North Carolina.

“It was Clean-burn Fuels. It was triggered by a Raleigh developer, who four years ago, like ever so many people in the country, said, ‘Oh, biofuels. That’s a good idea. I am going to scurry about get a lot of investment and set up an expensive plant.’”

The developer did so in Raeford in Hoke County, west of Fayetteville. Knowledgably taking a risk, he developed a plant — in advance of North Carolina’s other feedstock capabilities — that corn imported from the Midwest into ethanol, Burke said. In the past two months, the rising cost of corn and its importation made it unfeasible for the developer to buy the corn and sell the ethanol at reasonable costs.

Burke said that had the plant been operating at capacity. It would have generated $215 million in revenue for the state, not counting wage-related income, he said.

When asked about the negative perceptions of ethanol, Burke said he believes there is a difference between ethanol made from corn and ethanol made from other sources.

“It should be noted that North Carolina’s Strategic Plan for Biofuels Leadership, presented to and accepted by the N.C. Legislature in 2007 to trigger state policy and commitment, affirms that the state’s biofuels industry will not be based on corn,” he said.

“Instead, it will be biomass-based, and the primary feedstocks for biofuels in the state, including ethanol, will be woody biomass and energy grasses.”

Burke mentioned that the Eastern Gain Project and the Eastern Sprayfields Project, two initiatives of the Biofuels Center, illustrate a proper use of ethanol.

The Eastern Gain Project has a goal of developing a biomass supply chain from agricultural and forestland in North Carolina’s eastern counties for a facility capable of producing 50 million gallons a year of bio jet fuel for the military.

“In addition to the value it will bring to landowners supplying the biomass to the facility, preservation of rural land for profitable agricultural use is compatible with the needs of North Carolina’s growing military community,” Burke said.

The Eastern Sprayfields Project targets energy-grass yield on concentrated acres in Duplin, Sampson, and Wayne counties, while technically confirming that nitrogen and phosphorus from lagoon effluents are appropriately remediated to N.C. Department of Environment and Natural Resources standards. Effluent from the wastewater lagoons is sprayed on grass fields.

A portion of a white paper describing the Eastern Sprayfields Project reads: “U.S. Departments of Agriculture and Energy have established multiple programs for their second-generation biofuels agenda. One of the major challenges to the economic viability of any advanced biofuels program is the capacity for farmers to grow and deliver energy grasses at a suitable profit relative to traditional crops and at a cost-effective price point to biofuels producers. North Carolina sprayfield acreage in the Coastal Plain is rich row cropland producing little revenue for farmers beyond managing swine lagoon effluent.”

According to the Biofuels Center, coastal Bermuda grass produces roughly three tons of biomass per acre. Energy grasses can produce anywhere between six to 20 bone-dry tons of biomass per acre.

The five types of energy grasses that will be tested to confirm viability and quantify value are arundo donax, giant miscanthus, switchgrass, biomass sorghum and sweet sorghum.

The state is addressing other energy-related issues.

Legislation allowing for the state’s first steps toward offshore drilling has been approved.

Senate Bill 709, the Energy Jobs Act, sets out how drilling revenues and royalties would be apportioned, directs the governor to enter into a new offshore energy compact with governors off neighboring states and requires the DENR to report to lawmakers “on the commercial potential of onshore shale gas resources within the State as well as the regulatory framework necessary to develop this resource.”

The measure also rewrites the mandate of the state’s Energy Policy Council, created in 1975. It would become the Energy Jobs Council, focused on exploring and utilizing any energy resources available in the state.

The governor is expected to sign the bill into law.