Workshop Sessions
AFCC Conference Workshop Sessions
​
Workshop Session Details​
​
The Workshops will be on Sunday, November 1 and Tuesday, November 3
​
The AFCC Workshop sessions will offer a hands-on approach to learning in addition to skills-building. These sessions will offer a moderated, in-depth discussion among a group of experts offering diverse viewpoints around a particular topic.
The Workshop sessions are for those who seek to grow their industrial biotechnology knowledge, investment opportunities, government funding and for those seeking capital and sustainable solutions to real-world problems. These workshops will be packed with high energy and a must-attend event.
The AFCC Global Biobased Economy Conference & Exhibit organizes these workshops in order to connect you, the attendee, to industry leaders’ suppliers, investors, government agencies, engineering and construction organizations, technology insurance solutions, and peers. AFCC workshops are sponsored events from both public and private organizations.
​
Workshop sessions will be focused on the following five subject areas:
​
-
Biobased Manufacturing: Renewable Chemicals, Biopolymers, Biomaterials Creating a Cleaner Planet
-
Synthetic Biology, Alternative Proteins, Regenerative Agriculture, Food & Fiber
​
1. Crossing the Valley: The Terrain Map Between Announcement and Financial Close
Sunday, November 1 - 1:30 PM to 3:00 PM - National Harbor 5
Sponsored by:
Moderator: Cynthia Thyfault, Founder & CEO, Quanta Vision
Panelists:
TBA
Most first-of-a-kind (FOAK) bioeconomy projects don't stall because the technology fails. They stall in the valley between announcement and financial close — the place where lenders, offtakers, program officers, and insurers each price a different uncertainty before they'll say yes. This workshop maps that valley into nine confirmable constraints: FOAK evidence, feedstock security, bankable offtake, milestone sequencing, public-private capital layering, build-vs-enable route selection, logistics and aggregation, policy durability, and reading the deployment landscape without being misled by it. It also confronts the default reflex almost every founder reaches for first — raising straight equity — and why that capital structure predictably fails capital-intensive FOAK projects.
​
Rather than another panel on deal structures for projects that are already investable, this session works one level upstream: how a founder gets to that room in the first place. A moderator and five panelists — spanning commercial project finance, equity capital, offtake structuring, independent engineering, and a founder who has actually crossed the valley — lead a live terrain-mapping exercise. Attendees leave with a scored diagnostic of their own project across all nine domains and a short list of which uncertainty to retire next.
​
Framed by a real, near-fatal high-altitude climb to the monarch butterfly sanctuaries of Michoacán, Mexico, the session argues that the difference between founders who cross the valley and those who don't is rarely willpower — it is terrain literacy, honest self-assessment, and the guide beside them. Built for founders navigating first commercial deployment, and for the lenders and program officers who evaluate them, this is a working session, not a highlight reel. Expect candid, occasionally uncomfortable panel disagreement rather than consensus talking points, and a diagnostic tool every attendee keeps.
​
2. Carrying America's Biotech Momentum Forward in the 120th Congress
Sunday, November 1 - 3:30 PM to 5:00 PM - National Harbor 5
Sponsored by:
Moderator: Hannah Kelley, Senior Advisor Policy and External Affairs, National Security Commission on Emerging Biotechnology (NSCEB)
Panelists:
Senior Advisor Policy and External Affairs
National Security Commission on Emerging Biotechnology (NSCEB)
As the National Security Commission on Emerging Biotechnology concludes its work, this panel will examine how Congress can build on the significant biotechnology progress achieved during the 119th Congress and sustain that momentum into the next chapter. Moderated by the NSCEB, the discussion will feature Commission representatives alongside staff from the offices of the bipartisan Co-Chairs of the House BIOTech Caucus, exploring what comes after the Commission disbands, which priorities remain unfinished, and how stakeholders can continue advancing U.S. biotechnology leadership. Panelists will also highlight the BIOTech Caucus’s rapid expansion and growing influence during the 119th Congress and preview its plans to drive bipartisan biotechnology policy in the 120th Congress.
​
Further details on speakers and moderators Coming Soon.
​
3. Tax Incentives for Clean Fuels including Aviation and Maritime Fuels
Tuesday, November 3 - 10:00 to 11:30 AM - National Harbor 8
Sponsored by:
Moderator: Tim Urban, Principal Bracewell, Executive Director, Maritime Innovation Coalition
Panelists:
Ever since lawmakers evolved the GREEN Act and the Build Back Better Act into the iconic Inflation Reduction Act in 2021 and 2022, fuel producers and investors have been navigating the ups and downs of this radical conversion of assorted legacy clean fuels tax incentives into a synthesized technology-neutral program. First there were the challenges of understanding the enacted law, and then there was the implementation process undertaken by the Biden Administraton that culminated in the January, 2025 publication of several important IRS notices. After that, the Congress provided new clean fuels tax policy in July of 2025 by approving the One, Big, Beautiful Bill Act. Most recently, the Trump Administration published a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking in February of 2026, with taxpayers subsequently critiquing the NPRM during a comment period, and testifying at a public hearing.
Now, with taxpayers preparing to either claim production tax credits for fuel produced in 2025 or transfer the credits for cash, many questions remain unanswered. When will the government publish the final rules? Which technical issues remain to be resolved before taxpayers can claim tax credits? What role will National Labs and the Energy Department play in the final act? And, how does this process overlap or interact with the prospects for an upcoming tax bill in 2027?
The panelists from the AFCC Tax Incentives workshop were selected from among the most experienced tax lobbyists and tax transactional attorneys to help us understand where the process is at the moment, and help attendees work through the many thorny issues around implementation of the clean fuel production credit. They will also talk about the future of energy credits generally and the outlook for significant changes in 2027.
​
4. State of the Art Funding and Contract Structures for Successful Bioeconomy Development Capital and Project Financing
Tuesday, November 3 - 10:00 AM to 11:30 AM - National Harbor 6
Sponsored by:
Moderator: Mark J. Riedy, Partner, Womble Bond Dickinson LLP
Panelists:
This panel will be an expert moderated Q&A discussion of the most unique, challenging and cutting-edge funding and contractual structures currently available in and outside the US for bioeconomy projects and/or technology companies from the perspective of investment banks, insurance, institutional investors, developers, vendors and other major players in bioeconomy industries.
​
5. USDA Supporting Innovation Through Value-Added Agriculture
Tuesday, November 3 - 10:00 AM to 11:30 AM - National Harbor 7 - (Proposal Under Consideration)
Sponsored by:
Moderator: Kelly Bogle, Assistant Deputy Administrator, RBCS
Panelists:
James Campbell
Energy Programs Specialist
Section 9003
Derek Jones
Chief
BioPreferred Program
Deb Yocum
Supervisor
Rural Energy for America Program (REAP)
Rural Business-Cooperative Service (RBCS) focusing on promoting economic growth in rural communities by supporting businesses and cooperatives. These Programs in Energy Title IX in the Farm Bill plays a role in renewable energy and value-added agriculture helping rural areas diversify their economies and increasing access to capital, supporting cooperatives, and encouraging business innovation – making U.S producers to be competitive globally.
​
6. Advanced Mining and Mineral Production Technologies
Tuesday, November 3 - 10:00 AM to 11:30 AM - National Harbor 8 - (Proposal Under Consideration)
Sponsored by:
