Tennessee Valley Corridor leads south to transportation future  

The United States consumes and imports more oil than any other country. Of course, we also output a gross domestic product like no other, so it is essential that we push for technological advancement to maintain our competitiveness. From transportation to energy, the Tennessee Valley Corridor is providing national leadership to keep America at the forefront of innovation.

Through regional collaboration and cooperation, the Corridor can lead in creating the solutions to the problems we face in today’s changing world. The technology-rich Corridor is strategically linked by the world-class resources from the southern anchor of Northern Alabama through Tennessee into Southwest Virginia and Southern and Eastern Kentucky.

Another world-class resource is on its way to the Corridor in the recent announcement of Volkswagen, a biodiesel and hydrogen fuel cell leader, selecting Chattanooga for its first U.S. production facility. While the economic benefits are obvious – for every one manufacturing job, there are as many as seven support and service jobs – a major manufacturing plant for advanced transportation systems will have generational benefits in the region. Many people deserve a lot of credit because they have worked for years to bring about this day. It illustrates how the Tennessee Valley Corridor is thriving and Volkswagen is just our latest success story.

Nissan recently relocated its North American headquarters from Southern California to Franklin, Tenn., to join with its world-class assembly plant in Smyrna and engine plant in nearby Decherd, Tenn. That combined with the continually expanding Toyota engine plant in Huntsville, Ala., the reopening and expanded manufacturing lines by General Motors in Spring Hill, Tenn., ongoing expansions by hundreds of other top-tier automotive suppliers, such as Denso in Athens and Maryville, Tenn., to Aisin Automotive in Clinton, Tenn., it is easy to see that the Tennessee Valley Corridor has truly become the leader in defining the future of America’s advanced transportation industry.

The Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) was selected last year as one of only three sites in the country to establish and operate one of the U.S. Department of Energy’s new Bioenergy Research Centers. The center will accelerate research in the development of cellulosic ethanol and help make biofuel production cost competitive on a national scale by 2012 by improving the potential of switchgrass and poplar trees. Biofuels are going to be a part of the answer to our goal of energy independence, and our region will be out front with solutions.

The Corridor continues to be in the forefront of bioenergy development. DuPont and the University of Tennessee (UT) recently announced a partnership to build a cellulosic ethanol pilot biorefinery facility in Vonore, Tenn. The partnership will draw on UT’s expertise in cellulosic feedstock production and its work with Tennessee farmers to grow switchgrass as a dedicated cellulosic energy crop. The research and demonstrations being performed here will help our nation reduce its dependence on foreign oil. 

As advanced transportation solutions are researched and developed in the Corridor, they will need to be demonstrated prior to moving to marketplace. Our region also offers a transportation test track through a partnership with University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, Advanced Transportation Technology Institute and the Advanced Technologies for Transportation Research Program. 

Other countries need to see us proactively moving toward energy independence and a greener planet. The best way we can do this is to deploy the technologies and capitalize on our free-enterprise system to solve these problems. We must continue to invest in next generation vehicles to decrease our petroleum consumption. The future of advanced transportation manufacturing is in the southeastern United States and the Tennessee Valley Corridor will lead in the research, development, technology and manufacturing of clean energy solutions to the entire world while creating a generational legacy of economic opportunity for the people of the Tennessee Valley.