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The Carbon Model Project sponsored a workshop at the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest (CNNF). The entire Carbon Model team (Tom Gower, Scott Peckham, Puneet Kishor and Sam Batzli) drove up to CNNF office in Park Falls, WI, where approximately 18 USFS employees were in attendance. Gower provided an overview of the two modeling efforts to track the system (biological + industrial ecosystems) carbon balance for (i) biofuels and (ii) wood and paper products). Scott discussed the ongoing modeling efforts using Biome-BGC; Tom discussed the ongoing life cycle analysis modeling efforts, Puneet and Sam shared the vision for and the ongoing development and implementation of the web-based Carbon Management tool. Linda Parker, CNNF, updated the workshop participants on other carbon-related research efforts on the CNNF.
Natalie Hunt, a Ph.D. candidate working with Tom Gower, is examining the effects of the emerging bioenergy industry in the upper Midwest on future environmental policy. In particular, Natalie is studying the increasing significance of biofuel production with the expansion of renewable fuel standards in the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act. This project is in collaboration with the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC) in which Tom Gower is a co-PI in the "Sustainability Thrust" area. The Sustainability Thrust examines the economic and environmental sustainability of transforming biomass to biofuels through conducting life cycle analysis (LCA) of the biofuel production system. We are using a suite of computer modeling programs to conduct a comprehensive accounting of energy inputs/outputs and greenhouse gas emissions of the processes involved from the "field to the wheels". The major thrusts of life LCA within GLBRC include:
- Biological cycle of agricultural and forest systems,
- Industrial system of feedstock production, processing, and fuel distribution, and
- The underlying energy system that provides energy to and receives energy from the entire biofuel production system.
The Biome-BGC team provides the biophysical modeling of both agricultural and forest feedstock systems.
Tom Gower to present on the "use of an ecosystem process model for examining biofuel feedstock and potential environmental concerns" at a workshop organized by the University of Wisconsin Extension on Woody Biomass From Forests and Fields: Opportunities for Northern Wisconsin on April 9th in Cable, WI.
Scott Peckham will present a poster at the 4th Global Vegetation Workshop hosted by the Numerical Terradynamic Simulation Group at the University of Montana in June, 2009.
The Carbon Model group assembled a new Xgrid of 10 quad-core dual Xeon Xserves that will be dedicated to Biome-BGC computing. The cluster provides a combined CPU of 240 GHz with 30 TB of RAID and 320 GB of combined RAM connected at Gigabit speed. And, it does so at a total peak power consumption of 7,500 Watts. In other words, about 2.5 times the power of the previous cluster of 25 older Xserves at about 60% of power consumption.
MacResearch.org highlights Ben Bond-Lamberty's findings published in Nature. The modeling work was performed on OpenMacGrid.
