Staunton Green 2020

Taylor Cole is the man who can tell you, directly, what it’s like to grow switchgrass. Plus, he can share observation about the market potential for selling switchgrass. He’s such a believer he started Conservation Partners LLC.

He was kind enough to share his slides from this week’s “Switching to Grass and Fueling Staunton and Augusta” event.  For your convenience, there are notes below:

Slides 1-7 – Photos of Cole’s property where he grows switchgrass. He’s had the stand since 1999.

Slide 8-11 – Switchgrass can be harvested with farm equipment many farmers already own. It’s rolled into bales like hay.

Slide 12 – The main maintenance required is a controlled burn every few years.

Slide 13 – Mr. Cole in front of a switchgrass bale.

Slide 14 – Three current switchgrass projects that could be used for inspiration – one in Iowa, one in Texas – and one here in Virginia.

Slides 15-19 – You can burn switchgrass in conventional, coal burning furnaces. For example, here in Virginia, the Piedmont Geriatric Hospital is using switchgrass to heat the hospital.

Slides 20-21 – The need — for 10,000 tons of boiler-ready WSG (warm season grasses) to use as fuel – must be accomplished by collecting grasses nearby… which means there’s plenty of opportunity.

Slide 22 – Converting land into productive switchgrass is great for the wildlife and environment. But growing switchgrass can also keep more farm land from being lost.

Slide 23-25 – Growing switchgrass can provide ample fuel.

Remaining slides show photos and maps.

For your enjoyment, we’re doing a brief re-cap on this week’s switchgrass event. Our guests were kind enough to share their presentation slides.

Bobby Whitescarver, District Conservationist from Headwaters Soil and Water Conservation kicked things off with this presentation. In it,

Slides 4-7 – you’ll see photos of switchgrass, a warm season grass (wsg), grown on local farms.

Slide 8 – switchgrass being burned and used as a heat source

Slide 9 – here, heating a chicken coop

Slide 10 – This 60-foot border will be planted with switchgrass for wildlife benefits. (For quail and other endangered Virginia birds.)

Slide 11 – Indian grass (native and beautiful)

Slide 12 – A controlled burn – used every few years to reinvigorate switchgrass production.

What stands out for you from his presentation?

Right up there with New York and San Francisco, good old downtown Staunton comes in with an 83 out of 100 in the walkability index, making our humble hamlet a much desirable place to live in relation to assorted amenities such as restaurants, coffee shops, retail, theaters, schools, libraries, churches and so on. That’s great for the bottom line, and our bottom lines.

So get off your bum and head out to do the town if you live here, and if not, put Staunton on your list of possible vacation or relocation spots when you start calculating how to amp up your quality of life as the energy-environmental crunch starts descending upon us even more.

Staunton offers just the kind of place to move to because The Queen City is gorgeous, with blocks upon blocks of affordable, gracious, beautiful architecture surrounding its downtown, which is itself right smack on the rail line. I’ll say more about why you should move here and what kinds of businesses you should open in a future entry.

But interestingly, after more than a few months of soaring and fluctuating gas prices, and increased consumer costs, where news and commentary has focused on the high price of keeping our fuelish American lifestyle afloat, a bit of a backlash has erupted. It seems the thought of driving less, living more simply, and getting out into the fresh air for a walk has more than a few people hunkering down to mount a defense against more conscious living.

(more…)

Voices over the past century warning about drastic changes afoot in our lives have generally met with a mixture of indifference and scorn.

With cheap gas flowing from a seemingly perpetually available spigot, dire messages about the environmental impact of fossil fuels or a coming end to consumer excess were more often than not attributed to wackos. The collective conscious has never liked Cassandras anyway, and since most of the recent ones weren’t as hot as that Greek maven, we really had no use for them.

Its hard to say whether today’s cautionary voices on issues like peak oil and its repercussions, or those wailing over the climate and environmental picture, will continue to go in one ear and out the other, or worse, be met by counter analysts who caricature prognosticators with scathing derision.

Bottom line: Its tough out there in the marketplace of ideas. Still, a girls got to do what a girls got to do, leaving me no choice but to come out to the public as a high-heeled survivalist. (more…)