SUPERBEEST

Scaling Up PERennial Bioenergy Economics and Ecosystem Services Tool

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Introduction

SUPERBEEST is a free, online, geospatial tool under development to assist with decision-making regarding the adoption of perennial bioenergy crops in the Midwest, with the perennials integrated into marginal farmland currently in row crops (corn, soybean).

Current capabilities include the ability to identify and assess marginal farmland based on 7 economic or environmental marginality factors, and the ability to identify candidate locations for saturated bioenergy buffers. Future capabilities will include determination of the ecosystem services associated with a conversion to perennials and the estimation of the economics of that change.

The following download is an overview and tutorial.

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News

March 9, 2026 – Additional map overlays

An additional marginality – soil erosion based on SSURGO – is added. The Cropland layer, which is the footprint considered by SUPERBEEST for marginality analysis, is expanded to incorporate more crop types to align closer to Billion Ton 2023 assumptions.

February 18, 2026 – Added three states

OK, KY, TN are added to the original twelve-state footprint for marginality analysis.

February 4, 2026 – Regional economic data

A new layer shows where perennial bioenergy crops are generally more favorable than corn and soybeans in the Midwest on the basis of county-scale agricultural economic data (documentation in progress).

June 10, 2025 – Farmer survey

American Farmland Trust and Argonne National Laboratory are conducting a brief survey on the adoption of perennial bioenergy crops on farms in the Midwest. Use this link to participate.

January 8, 2025 – Leaching improvement

The nitrate and pesticide leaching marginalities capability has improved accuracy.

October 8, 2024 – Cropland footprint

The USDA Cropland footprint for corn, soybean, and pasture has been added as a feature to toggle on and off, allowing users to view the footprint of rowcrop land considered by SUPERBEEST as it maps marginal farmland.

March 20, 2024 – Composite marginalities

The color coding scheme for composite marginalities is simplified and improved.

October 2, 2023 – Help us improve SUPERBEEST!

Please fill out our questionnaire to provide feedback on how we can improve SUPERBEEST.

August 23, 2023 – An overview and a mini tutorial are now available

Please download the Tutorial for more information on SUPERBEEST.

August 7, 2023 – SUPERBEEST goes public

SUPERBEEST is now publicly available. A user’s guide is in progress. Check back for updates.

Related bioenergy and ecosystem services research by Argonne National Laboratory: https://web.evs.anl.gov/bioenergy