energy.agwired.com

The first biodiesel plant in Southwest Florida could soon go on line… although some of its first fuel will be sold a loss.

The Fort Meyers News-Press reports that a site for FL BioFuels LLC’s three-million-gallon-a-year plant should be picked in the next couple of weeks, and one of its first customers will get a substantial discount on the fuel it buys:

The plant is capable of producing 3 million gallons of biodiesel in its first year, said Roy Benton Jr., one of the company’s four owners, and that could bring in more than $5 million. As a result, FL BioFuels’ owners hope doing business with Lee County will pay off.

“It’s not a big contract with the county,” Benton Jr., said. “What is does is give us tremendous credibility.”

The feedstock for the biodiesel will be leftover restaurant grease, which is why one of FL Biofuels’ owners… the owner of a Hooters franchise… is involved. Plus, the county is currently buying biodiesel from Malaysia, which clears rain forests to grow the palm oil for its biodiesel.

When it is opened, it will be Florida’s third biodiesel plant.

People in the Southwest Minnesota town of Brewster are back in their homes after a spectacular weekend fire at a nearby biodiesel forced their evacuation.

This story from KSFY-TV in nearby Sioux Falls, SD has more details about the Minnesota Soybean Processors Plant fire (and some pretty cool video if you click on the picture to the left):

The fire was so big that the Nobles County sheriff’s officials went to each and every house asking people to leave, including one mother KSFY Action News caught up with.

Deputy State Fire Marshall Investigator Steve Kellen hasn’t ruled what caused the fire and says the determination of the cause will continue throughout the week but the loss for the plant is substantial.

No serious injuries were reported from the fire.

The SeQuential Pacific Biodiesel plant… the largest biodiesel plant in Oregon… is opening back up for business a month after it had laid off some of its workforce.

This story in the Salem (OR) Statesman Journal says warmer weather is helping move more biodiesel in the state:

SeQuential Pacific Biodiesel in Salem was built to produce 5.8 million gallons of biodiesel per year.

“That helped dig our inventory down,” said plant manager Tyson Keever, enough so that last week six people laid off at the end of March were hired back.

The article goes on to say that the closure of the Imperium Renewables biodiesel plant, in nearby Hoquiam, Washington has helped eliminate some of SeQuential’s competition. The Salem refinery will be running at about half capacity.

Members of the American Soybean Association (ASA) were back on Capitol Hill… this time testifying before the House Small Business Subcommittee on Regulations, Healthcare and Trade that the new proposed Environmental Protection Agency rules are undermining investor confidence in the biodiesel industry.

Biodiesel Magazine reports that the ASA complained the EPA rules, which excludes soy-based biodiesel from the fuels counted under the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS), will hurt small biofuels producers and family farmers:

At the top of ASA’s list of regulatory policy concerns is the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Notice of Proposed Rulemaking for implementation of the expanded RFS2. This Proposed Rule, released on May 5, includes several very obvious and immediate flaws and concerns.

“We are also very concerned with the potential under the EPA Proposed Rule to require renewable fuel manufactures to prove that their feedstocks meet the definition of renewable biomass,” Gaesser said. “The Energy Independence and Security Act included a prescriptive definition of renewable biomass and the EPA Proposed Rule would limit eligibility to biofuels produced only from feedstocks grown on existing cropland. This requirement could result in the need to provide feedstock certification. Such feedstock certification would be onerous and unworkable.”

You can read all of ASA’s testimony here.