From the U.S. Endowment for Forestry & Communities: The U.S. Endowment today released its fifth request for pre-proposal (RFP). "This effort to assess 'The State of Wood-based Bio-energy/Bio-fuels Technologies and Industries in North America' (PDF) expands our reach both programmatically and geographically," said Endowment President Carlton Owen. "Not only are we intent on understanding the state of the science as relates to commercial applications in conversion of wood to energy, but we are also hoping to establish a state-of-the-art system to track such use across North America," he continued.

For the first time in any of its announced initiatives, the Endowment will be joined in this project by other funding partners. Among those already committed are the U.S.D.A. Forest Service, American Forest & Paper Association and Forest Products Association of Canada. Products from the work will include a "state of the field" in terms of commercial applications of technologies on one hand and a real-time system to track the use of woody biomass as an energy raw material on the other. The RFP will be open for 30 days.