Todd Sneller, administrator of the Nebraska Ethanol Board, will retire Sept. 14 after more than 40 years of service with the state of Nebraska.

LONGTIME ROLE: Todd Sneller has been administrator of the Nebraska Ethanol Board for nearly 40 years.

Sneller began his career in 1976 as a staff assistant with the Agriculture Products Industrial Utilization Committee, now the Nebraska Ethanol Board. He left for a brief period from 1978 to 1979 to work as a business development consultant for the Nebraska Department of Economic Development. In May 1979, the Nebraska Ethanol Board recruited him to serve as its administrator — a role he has held ever since.

Starting his administrator career when the U.S. faced the third serious oil supply shortage of the 1970s, Sneller engaged in advancing ethanol from a concept to a partial replacement of fossil fuels. The U.S. gasoline supply now contains more than 10% ethanol, and Nebraska ranks No. 2 nationally in ethanol production. The state has 25 ethanol plants with an annual production capacity of 2.5 billion gallons of ethanol.

The Nebraska Ethanol Board selected Sarah Thornton Caswell of Omaha as the next administrator. Caswell recently served as vice president of Government and Regulatory Affairs for Edeniq, a technology firm serving the biofuels industry. Caswell earned her juris doctor from American University’s Washington College of Law in Washington, D.C., and is a member of the Illinois Bar. She will assume the role of board administrator Sept. 17.

Wilkins named Nebraska Corn Checkoff presidential chair

Mark Wilkins, professor of biological systems engineering and food science and technology at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, has been named Nebraska Corn Checkoff presidential chair.

The Nebraska Corn Board made a $2 million commitment to the University of Nebraska Foundation in 2014 to establish the permanently endowed chair. The endowment provides annual support to the university’s Institute of Agriculture and Natural Resources for research and development related to corn demand.

Wilkins has been at UNL since 2016. As director of the Industrial Agricultural Products Center, he works to build new partnerships across campus and with industry to develop innovative products that add value to agricultural crops.

Giesler to lead UNL Plant Pathology Department

Loren Giesler has been named head of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Plant Pathology Department, effective Sept. 1. Giesler is currently a professor and Extension plant pathologist within the department.

The Plant Pathology Department performs an essential role in improving and monitoring plant health, through outreach, education, research and fostering of economic development and market competitiveness.

Giesler has spent his career at UNL, beginning as a graduate research assistant, and then serving as a research technologist, and Plant and Pest Diagnostic Clinic coordinator before advancing in the faculty from assistant professor to professor. In his current role, Giesler provides statewide leadership for Nebraska Extension’s plant pathology programs in soybeans and turfgrass.

Service to ag, Extension recognized

Nebraska Extension in the Panhandle recently recognized ag honorees and the Service to Extension in the Panhandle award recipient.

Ag honorees include Arden Wohlers of Scottsbluff, a retired veterinarian who has served as partner and owner at Pioneer Animal Clinic in Scottsbluff. Once an Extension veterinarian, he now operates a cattle ranch along the Niobrara River in Box Butte County.

Tom Hayden, longtime supervisor at the Bridgeport office of the Nebraska Department of Natural Resources, was also named an ag honoree.

Sandra Hansen of Torrington, Wyo., who spent nearly two decades covering agricultural and regional news as ag editor at the Scottsbluff Star-Herald newspaper, was honored for Service to Extension.