L-R: ACE president Dave Sovereign, Merle Anderson Award winner Rick Schwark; ACE CEO Brian Jennings
Schwark stepped down as CEO of Absolute Energy in 2024 but remains as Chairman Board of Directors and continues to serve on the Board of Directors for not only ACE, but also the Renewable Fuels Association, Growth Energy, Iowa RFA, and U.S. Grains and Bioproducts Council.
Schwark has also been a strong proponent of aromatics cancer research being done at Hormel Institute. “Ethanol, along with its you know great fuel attributes, is non-carcinogenic and cancer is a big thing and a lot of people like people’s lives and if your family’s been affected by it you know what I’m talking about and you know the emissions reduction from and the tailpipe cleanup created by ethanol has significant carcinogenic benefits and that research that the Hormel Institute, along with the University of Minnesota, University of Illinois-Chicago, and others is proving that data out,” said Schwark.
2025 ACE - Merle Anderson Award (8:39)2025 ACE - interview with Rick Schwark, Absolute Energy (4:13)
L-R: John Christianson (2024); Ron Alverson (2023); Rick Schwark (2025); Bob Scott (2020); Scott Parsley (2007)
All five gathered to pose for a photo: John Christianson, managing partner of Christianson & Associates, PLLP (2024); Ron Alverson, South Dakota farmer and carbon “guru” who helped found Dakota Ethanol (2023); Rick Schwark (2025); Bob Scott who served as the ACE Board President from 1999 to 2009 representing Poet Ethanol Products (2020); and one of ACE’s founding board members, Scott Parsley (2007).
Listen to an interview with Bob Scott below, who was president of ACE when the RFS was signed 20 years ago.
2025 ACE conference - Bob Scott, former ACE president (3:52)