Biofuels Digest recently released its “Top 125 in the Advanced Bioeconomy,” ranking Bioenergy Technologies Office (BETO) Director Dr. Jonathan Male, Deputy Director Dr. Valerie Reed, Technology Manager Dr. Joyce Yang, and Lead Analyst Zia Haq at number 20.

Other Energy Department leaders also scored high. U.S. Secretary of Energy Dr. Ernest Moniz came in fourth and U.S. Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Dr. David Danielson was 18th, along with Peter Davidson, Executive Director of the U.S. Department of Energy's Loan Programs Office. For the fifth year in a row, Biofuels Digest honored Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack as the most significant person in the bioeconomy. BETO partners with the U.S. Department of Agriculture on Biomass Research and Development.

Each year, Biofuels Digest, a widely read online biofuels trade publication, and its readers nominate and vote on the most influential leaders and pioneers in advancing the research, development, and distribution of biofuels.  

According to Biofuels Digest editor and publisher Jim Lane, this year “the voters increasingly turned to actual production…and the political and financial leaders associated with deployment.” The high ranking of BETO staff shows industry recognition of BETO’s role in concretely moving the advanced bioeconomy forward to commercialization.

Congratulations to all who made Biofuels Digest’s Top 125!

The Bioenergy Technologies Office forms cost-share public-private partnerships to help sustainably develop cost-competitive biofuels and bioproducts in the United States from non-food biomass resources, working toward a cost goal of $3/gallon gasoline equivalent for advanced hydrocarbon biofuels.