In an effort to quell some of the rumors that they might back out of building the nation’s largest biodiesel plant, senior managers for Smiling Earth Energy held a press conference today on a dock overlooking the Elizabeth River’s Southern Branch… the future site of a 320-million-gallon-a-year biodiesel refinery.
This article in the Hampton Roads PilotOnline says it was the first time the Smiling Earth team had appeared together in public after filing plans for the plant six months ago:
Donning blue SE-Energy shirts, the managers said they had years of experience in developing all kinds of plants.
They produced a letter of support from the owner of the Chesapeake land they plan to develop.
But on the eve of the City Council’s vote Tuesday night on the biodiesel proposal, as the managers talked about the ease with which they would bring the project to life, the company continued to overstate its key managers’ biodiesel experience.
The plant would be Smiling Earth’s first commercial biodiesel plant.
The managers promised the biodiesel would be good for the environment, and the operation of the plant would not congest traffic in the area.