Project History

1970s

  • Terry Tomlinson served five years as a Naval Aviator including tours in Vietnam. He worked in agriculture and commercial lending in Illinois. He bought, operated and sold 4 businesses (2 retail and 2 manufacturing) purchased from retiring owners in Illinois and Utah.
  • Terry Harris attended college at the US Air Force Academy and the University of Missouri, studying Biology and participating in three varsity level sports.

1980s

  • Tomlinson moved to the San Francisco area to research venture capitalists and Stanford University technology transfer. He conducted research to support private early seed capital investment opportunities for individual investors. He learned about early computer voice technology for education and telemedicine. He moved to Omaha NE to conduct private research for AT&T to support voice technology in rural school districts in Nebraska and Maine.
  • Harris graduated from the University of Missouri with a BA in Biology and a Masters in Human Performance. While in college, he computerized the Human Performance Lab at MIZZOU, and then took that experience into the fitness industry as a partner in a large fitness facility. In addition to managing the facility, he wrote several computer programs that were used in the facility and later used as the key technology aspect of nutritional programs. Harris met an entrepreneur who had an idea for wellness based insurance, and the two of them wrote a business plan that would later be used as the basis for a PhD dissertation by John Bangs. As part of this business plan process, Bangs and Harris regularly met with Former Mayor of Kansas City MO, Dr. Charles Wheeler.

1990s

  • Tomlinson moved to Lenexa KS in the Kansas City Metro area. He explored telemedicine opportunities with rural Kansas hospitals based out of Saint Luke’s Hospital in Kansas City. He also met with Mayo Clinic doctors in Rochester MN regarding telemedicine opportunities. Among his collaboration team was former Kansas City MO Mayor, Dr. Charles Wheeler.
  • Harris left the fitness industry for community economic development becoming the second director of the Lee’s Summit Main Street program in a historic “edge city” of Kansas City. After achieving success, he was recruited to take over MainCor – a commercial and neighborhood based community economic development program – managing activities in a 20 block section of Main Street. After a successful two years, he took a position in Wilson NC promoting information bandwidth based business development as well as managing community development in poverty stricken neighborhoods in the town.

1995 – 2000

  • Tomlinson was referred to Harris by Dr. Charles Wheeler. After a series of in-depth conversations, the “two Terrys” decided to form a partnership taking advantage of their unique backgrounds to work with rural areas under the name of Initiative for a Competitive Rural America.
  • Iowa – Tomlinson took the lead in Manning IA working with two community champions evaluating the assets in the region to serve as a basis for business development. He helped Manning develop a locally owned telephone service, taking advantage of access to broadband telecommunications infrastructure. He evaluated the possibility of forming a Southeast Iowa Rural Venture Fund. He also worked with Iowa State University researchers and Iowa Economic Development to open discussions around Precision Agriculture and Bio-based manufacturing of advanced materials using crop and animal waste as feedstock.
  • Bio-based Technology Transfer – Tomlinson took the lead reaching out to the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) for bio-based business forecast research; University of Kansas, Kansas State University, South Dakota State, University of North Dakota regarding bio-based feedstocks and advanced materials manufacturing, and local economic development officials.
  • North Carolina – Harris conducted what many consider the first ever Cyberscape planning exercise to evaluate access to broadband telecommunication resources and identify businesses opportunities made possible by digital infrastructure. While not a direct outcome of the initial Cyberscape planning effort, there is a program called Gig East Exchange in Wilson NC that provides access to innovators to develop businesses using digital infrastructure.

2000s

  • Harris and Tomlinson formed BioEconomic Development Corporation (BEDC) to identify technology transfer opportunities for development in Rural America. BEDC focused on innovations needing Technical and Economic Evaluation in order to attract the funding necessary for commercial scale development.
  • Projects included various forms of steam reforming and pyrolysis to take agricultural waste streams to produce energy and biochar. These activities brought us into contact with West Texas A&M University President and key staff working in agriculture technology transfer; a contract with Dumas TX to look for a project funding partner in advanced manufacturing using bio-based feedstock; and a collaboration with Greensburg KS to work on circular economic development strategies for a community rebuild after a devasting tornado. Our work with Greensburg took us to The Sustainability Consortium at the University of Arkansas. The story of Greensburg motivated us to form Green-G Network, which would focus more on communities that needed to rebuild and restore their economic base by connecting communities to experts in our network.
  • At this point, we pivoted to researching the issues related to the invasive Eastern Red Cedar (ERC) species (groundwater depletion, wildfire risks, native wildlife species displacement) and finding pathways to value added and advanced materials using pyrolysis as the conversion and processing technology. ERC testing was conducted at the University of Tennessee and access to federally funded research was explored at Oak Ridge National Lab.

2010s

  • Based on a pyrolysis technology we identified, a proposal was submitted to the City of Lee’s Summit MO to take over the city’s MSW facility after scheduled closure. Our proposal made the final cut for consideration. It involved redirecting the flow of MSW waste to an onsite sorting facility, where material appropriate for pyrolysis would be processed to syngas to power electricity generators for use at municipal and school district owned facilities, and the biochar left over would be used for other applications. Our proposal was eliminated because we could not take the committee to a facility located in the continental US.
  • Tomlinson contracted with USDA ARS as a Principal Investigator on a NIFA grant to research the development of a new canola bio-oil to be used as feedstock for a Honeywell green aviation fuel manufacturing technology. This role brought him into contact with multiple airline aviation fuel purchasing executives to research their goals and plans for Sustainable Aviation Fuel.
  • Tomlinson contracted with Enid OK economic development to research advanced material recovery and manufacturing from local oil well produced water and ERC biochar; conducted produced water chemical analysis from Enid region oil wells to determine recoverability of advanced materials; and personally funded ERC biochar research with the National Laboratory of Canada to determine feasibility for carbon nanotube manufacturing. As biochar production and functionalization technologies have continued to advance, we believe that a renewed focus on Eastern Red Cedar may be warranted.
  • Tomlinson continued his Green-G Network building activities, meeting with senior leadership of Savannah River National Lab; South Carolina pulp and paper manufacturing companies; North Carolina State University technology transfer officials and research professors (including funding an exclusive evaluation option for a key technology that would take inputs from various biomass sources to create a standardized feedstock for industrial processes); and multiple meetings with Oklahoma State University technology transfer officials and research professors regarding ERC collection and processing for ERC based biochar production for advanced material manufacturing.
  • Tomlinson had multiple research meetings with the technology transfer department at the University of Alabama Huntsville and the Huntsville based U.S. Army Aviation and Missile Command regarding University research on bio-based feedstocks for advanced materials to be used in hypersonic missile manufacturing.

2020s

  • After COVID, we looked for an urban industrial corridor to demonstrate that our methodology would be able to battle poverty in distressed residential and commercial census tracts adjacent to industrial corridors in need of re-purposing. In 2021, Economic Development Corporation of Kansas City and The Port Authority of Kansas City were working on such a plan for the Blue River Valley Industrial Corridor. This led to building a network of contacts in Kansas City to take advantage of a city led effort to turn one of the first industrial manufacturing corridors which had a couple of brownfield areas, an MSW transfer station, a large composting operation and two WWTP facilities. This project is currently evaluating the feasibility of circular economic development activities, with Green-G Network still involved in bringing innovation to the area.
  • Tomlinson conducted research on distressed census tracts in New Mexico as defined by the US Dept. of Treasury eligibility for New Market Tax Credits. This research led to conversations with regional economic development contacts about how our process works and an invitation for Harris to visit New Mexico to meet community leaders east of the Rocky Mountains.
  • Since 2023, we have been deeply involved in New Mexico, working with innovators in the Sangre De Cristo Mountains and Tucumcari. We have conducted extensive research to bring new sources of capital to help fund these projects and unfunded essential infrastructure projects in Northern and Northeastern New Mexico communities. We have identified Impact and Philanthropic Capital to we believe can be the basis to establish a Rural Infrastructure Equity Fund to fill capital gaps to complete projects to help make these communities investable.