Big Company Gets Big Incentives To Build Big Biodiesel Plant

Cindy Zimmerman

Louis Dreyfus The biggest biodiesel plant in the world is being built in Claypool, Indiana, according to this article from IndyStar.com. The project, which was announced last year, combines a soybean processing plant with a biodiesel production plant. The facility will crush nearly 50 million bushels of soybeans a year, producing more than 1 million tons of soybean meal for animal feed and 80 million gallons of biodiesel. The plant is being bulit by global agribusiness giant Louis Dreyfus, a French conglomerate that is into just about everything from citrus to coffee to cotton, real estate and manufacturing to telecommunications – you name it. They have offices in Asia, Argentina, Canada and Kansas City, just to name a few. My question is, why Claypool Indiana? This little burg with a population of 311 according to the 2000 census is located about halfway between Ft. Wayne and Chicago – which might be a reason. During the aforementioned Ag Energy Summit in Washington, DC, Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels announced that the state is providing between somewhere in the neighborhood of $6.5 million in tax credits and other incentives to Louis Dreyfus to build the plant.

Biodiesel