Hemp4Fuel.com : News > Biodiesel

“First economical process” for making biodiesel fuel from algae

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 23:22:47 -0700

Chemists are reporting development of what they termed the first economical, eco-friendly process to convert algae oil into biodiesel fuel — a discovery they predict could one day lead to U.S. independence from petroleum as a fuel.

One of the problems with current methods for producing biodiesel from algae oil is the processing cost, and the New York researchers say their innovative process is at least 40 percent cheaper that of others now being used.

Supply will not be a problem: There is a limitless amount of algae growing in oceans, lakes, and rivers, throughout the world. Another benefit from the “continuously flowing fixed-bed” method to create algae biodiesel, they add, is that there is no wastewater produced to cause pollution.

[link=hyperlink url]http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/1296516[/link]

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[[b]Submitted by KEVswr[/b]]

VW Races Ahead With Biodiesel

Tue, 10 Mar 2009 11:01:37 -0700

By Tony Borroz

There are two givens in the auto industry these days (well, three, actually, since the automakers are in a heap of trouble): Cars must become more environmentally friendly and the best way to make eco-friendly cars that people want is to make them fun to drive.
Racing is fun and brings all sorts of valuable technology to our everyday rides. So, when Volkswagen started a single-make race series featuring their sweet Jetta diesels, we got excited because it will make the VWs everyone else drives that much better.
Now that VW is fueling those cars with biodiesel, we're really excited.
It is well-known in the automotive world that racing is a wellspring for innovation. If you want to make sure something Works with a capital double-u, take it to the track. If it works there, it'll work in the much more lenient world of street cars. Hell, Ferrari is based on this simple premise.
VW knows this too. Last year, it launched a race series exclusively for the Jetta TDI, which named Green Car Journal's Green Car of the Year. It isn't so much the fact it's the Jetta, or even VW, that makes this so interesting, but the fact they're running diesels.
Diesels make a whole bunch of sense in racing. Just ask Audi or Peugeot, which thoroughly dominated Le Mans with them last year. You get better mileage, bags and bags of torque and, if you want to be clever about it, fuel made from leftover french fry grease. That's the revelation that came to VW as it put together the 2009 TDI Cup season, which will see every car on the grid running a mixture that is 5 percent biodiesel.
OK, that's not a huge amount, but it's a start, and it follows Audi's experimentation with biodiesel at Le Mans. Clark Campbell, motorsport manager for Volkswagen of America, says the move "further demonstrates the feasibility of biodiesel as an alternative fuel source for American consumers and supports the clean and green racing of the Jetta TDI Cup series."
You can extrapolate this out to see where it leads. If it works in a Jetta on the track and can be fun, then it can work in a Jetta on the street and be fun. If it works in a Jetta on the street and is fun, then it could work in a proper sport scar and be even more fun. And VW can reliably run 5 percent bio-D now, it should be able to reliably up that percentage before long.
If someone builds a car that's as much fun as, say, a Toyota MR2 or Mazda Miata and runs on, say, 80 percent biodiesel made from used veggie oil, then the future will be very bright indeed.

[link=hyperlink url]http://blog.wired.com/cars/2009/03/tdi-cup-means-c.html[/link]

[[b]Submitted by kabukisensei[/b]]

Cold-weather soy fuel test in Fairbanks has biodiesel advocates thrilled

Mon, 09 Mar 2009 11:00:38 -0700

By Amanda Bohman

FAIRBANKS ([link=http://newsminer.com/news/2009/mar/09/cold-weather-soy-fuel-test-fairbanks-has-biodiesel/]newsminer.com[/link]) — Discarded restaurant frying oil, put through a process no more difficult than a high school chemistry experiment, can be used to heat buildings and fuel pickup trucks.

But there’s a problem, at least in northern climates.

The cooking-oil-turned-biodiesel gels in freezing temperatures, leaving behind a nasty sludge that builds up in filters and tanks.

An Indiana outfit says it has solved that problem and is touting its product, Permaflo Biodiesel, in Alaska.

What the Indiana Soybean Alliance is selling, starting next winter, they hope, is a refining process that alters the chemical composition of biodiesel to prevent it from gelling in temperatures down to 60 below.

If the claim is true and the price is right, the product could transform the Fairbanks Biodiesel Cooperative into a year-round operation, cooperative vice president Garrison Collette said. The 3-year-old group more or less goes dormant during Fairbanks’ long subarctic winter.

The technology also has the potential to help Fairbanks remove itself from the federal government’s air-pollution watch list, Fairbanks North Star Borough Mayor Jim Whitaker said. Biodiesel burns much cleaner than petroleum diesel fuel.

The soybean alliance arranged for a barge to transport some of the fuel from Seattle to Anchorage, and last week a group of scientists drove a pickup truck and a small bus borrowed from the University of Alaska Fairbanks, up the Parks Highway from Palmer using Permaflo Biodiesel.

On Saturday, the scientists drove to the Arctic Circle using Permaflo and ran a generator on the fuel.

The biodiesel demonstration was supposed to take place at Yellowstone National Park in January, but that endeavor fell through.

“At the last minute, they backed out,” Purdue University’s Bernie Tao, the lead scientist on the project, said in an interview after arriving in Fairbanks last week.

Tao said the biodiesel performed “perfectly” during the drive down the Parks Highway.

“It’s darn cold up here,” he said. “We had no problems running it. We’re burning it at 100 percent.”

The soybean alliance, made up of farmers, is looking for more uses for soybeans, a biofuel feedstock. But there are many potential feedstocks for biodiesel, including fish oil, which is being studied as a potential source of fuel in rural Alaska. These non-soybean sources of biodiesel also can be converted into the low-temperature fuel.

Collette said the biodiesel cooperative is doing its own study to learn how much waste vegetable oil is available from Fairbanks eateries to make biodiesel.

Members have looked into additives to keep the fuel from gelling in the cold, he said.

“So far we haven’t found one that will work all the way down to 40 below,” Collette said.

The cooperative produces biodiesel for its members, but Collette said the cooperative hopes to sell it someday. Using Permaflo technology would be a leap forward toward that goal.

“This is very interesting,” Collette said in an e-mail after studying the soybean alliance’s Web site, www.indianasoybean.com, and other Internet sources. “I think they are onto something here. I hope we can get a bit of this to sample.”

A local pumping and thawing company uses biodiesel to heat some buildings, and a mechanic used it for a time to heat his shop until it became too much work, Collette said.

“The process of turning veggie oil into biodiesel is labor intensive and expensive,” Collette said.

The biggest expense is methanol, which is shipped from Tacoma, Wash., he said.

Whitaker met with the scientists and representatives of the soybean alliance on Friday. The borough runs an air quality program after the Environmental Protection Agency deemed Fairbanks a non-attainment area, meaning the air quality falls below minimum standards.

Whitaker wants to encourage cold-weather testing in Fairbanks, he said, but he also is interested in biodiesel applications in Fairbanks as a means to improve the air quality.

“It looks very promising,” the mayor said after the meeting. “Biofuel can be used in home heating systems with no conversion costs.”

Megan Kuhn, a spokeswoman for the soybean alliance, said the organization is documenting the trip through Alaska and plans to use the information in promotional materials.

The alliance wants to sell its technology to biodiesel producers, she said. A price for the technology has not yet been set, but Kuhn said producers should be able to make Permaflo Biodiesel for a price comparable to what it costs to buy traditional diesel fuel at the pump.

“It won’t be cheaper,” the spokeswoman said.

A closed-door UAF-sponsored workshop on Permaflo Biodiesel and biofuel applications in Alaska is planned for today at Pike’s Waterfront Lodge.
[[b]Submitted by Manhydra[/b]]

3 Gross Green Fuels That are Powering Vehicles Now

Thu, 05 Feb 2009 11:43:49 -0700

http://www.usnews.com/blogs/fresh-greens/2009/2/5/3-gross-green-fuels-that-are-powering-vehicles-now.html?s_cid=etRR-0306

Source: US News and World Report
By: Maura Judkis

Corn, soybeans and cooking oil are ingredients that can go between our kitchens and our cars, since they can be used for fuel. They're not the only sources, though, as recent headlines have been made by far more unusual - and sometimes icky - substances powering our vehicles. Here are a few:

The least disagreeable ingredient on this list is beer waste, which the Sierra Nevada Brewing will use to power the company's trucks. The waste, which is made of yeast, will be put through an on-site ethanol machine for fermentation, and then added to gasoline to be used in the brewer's fleet of biodiesel trucks. Any surplus fuel may even be given to the company's employees. Sierra Nevada generates 1.6 million gallons of beer dregs each year.

Next, a British town has introduced a garbage can that is run by garbage. It won't work quite like the beer trucks - the garbage collected for the truck is actually incinerated, which generates electricity for the plug-in hybrid garbage truck. It takes between six and eight hours for the truck to fully charge. Hybrids are a great choice for garbage trucks because they are slow moving and spend much of their time idling (though incineration, unfortunately, has its environmental downsides).

Finally, there's the fuel that lives up to the headline of this story - some city buses in Norway are now fueled by human waste. Biomethane from two sewage treatment plants in Oslo will be captured and used as fuel for the buses, cutting the carbon footprint of both the plants and the bus fleet. It's not quite as gross as it sounds - microorganisms will break down the waste before it's used in the buses, so no one's health is at stake. The gas is an economic draw as well as an environmental one - each liter is 50 cents cheaper than diesel.

[[b]Submitted by hempistry[/b]]

Afro-Colombians fight biodiesel producers

Sun, 21 Dec 2008 14:03:26 -0700

Afro-Colombians fight biodiesel producers

By Jane Monahan
Bogota

For Afro-Colombians evicted from their land in north-western Colombia and along the Pacific coast, the loss of familiar surroundings of lush jungle and rugged mountains can be devastating .

Take Yajaira, a slender 18-year-old, one of four children whose family was displaced from a settlement in the Cacarica river basin just south of Colombia's border with Panama.

She misses her place of origin deeply.

"My home was surrounded by banana and mango trees, and coconut palms," she recalls, fingering a bracelet she wears made of seeds and feathers gathered in tropical forests.

"We used to bathe and fish in a nearby stream."

Currently, Yayaira spends part of the year in Bogota, Colombia's Andean capital, where blue-black clouds seem to hover perpetually over the city.

It often rains and it is cold, in sharp contrast to the sultry heat of the north-west.

Tens of thousands of other displaced Afro-Colombians are also dispersed in Colombian cities.

Many live precariously in sprawling shantytowns, such as Ciudad Bolivar, in the south of the capital.

"A peasant without land is like a being without life," Yajaira says, clearly not convinced by the urban existence.

"We don't know how to live in towns."

Displaced, black and poor

Talking to Jose Caceido, another displaced Afro-Colombian, there is so much tension in the air it almost seems as if you could cut it with a knife.

Mr Caceido, in his early 30s, says he moved to Bogota in 2001 after being threatened by presumed paramilitaries in Tumaco, a Pacific coast region.

"We have been discriminated against in three ways," he says with steely restraint.

"We are displaced, we are black and we are poor."

It is Mr Caceido's view that underlying the displacement of countless Afro-Colombians is a clash in values between the communities' use of the land and an initiative of Colombian President Alvaro Uribe to produce more palm oil for biodiesel.

For Afro-Colombians, Mr Caceido says, land use is based on cultivating a few traditional crops for subsistence - such as corn, yucca and cocoa - or for hunting and fishing.

But, according to human rights organisations working in the north-west Choco province, and in dense forests along the Pacific, paramilitary gangs are seizing Afro-Colombian land to facilitate biofuel conglomerates.

The land is also being transformed, with elaborate network of highways, drainage canals and palm oil plantation sites. Tropical forests are cut down, water sources diverted, to aid the development of agribusiness projects.

The changes make it harder for the Afro-Colombians to ever recover their former way of life, observes Mr Caceido. "Once palm oil is planted we cannot hunt anymore because the animals have fled," he says.

"There is no more birdsong because the forests have been cut down. The soil hardens for lack of shade. Rivers dry up. Nothing else grows except palm."

Source of revenue

President Uribe's government is pinning a lot of hopes on its palm oil strategy, however.

The government says it wants the area planted with the crop to increase tenfold in the next decade to more than three million hectares, or some seven million acres.

It believes the cash crop, which is also used in many foods, will be a viable source of revenue for the government.

It hopes bio-diesel will solve air pollution in cities.

It is confident it can be an economic alternative to the cultivation of coca, the raw material of cocaine, for many Colombian farmers.

Not banned

But the increasing deforestation and humanitarian costs associated with President Uribe's policy have led human rights organisations and many concerned observers to ask: what went wrong?

According to the Inter-Church Justice and Peace Commission, (ICJPC), a human rights organisation, a fundamental problem is that paramilitary gangs, apparently funded by the drugs trade and listed by Washington as terrorist organisations, have not been disbanded in Choco and the Pacific region.

In many other parts of the country, they have been banned under a government security plan.

"The paramilitaries re-engineered themselves," says Danilo Rueda, a founding member of ICJPC and a lawyer who represents Afro-Colombian families from Choco at hearings of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights.

"The same ones that started protecting businessmen, and which participated in military campaigns against leftwing guerillas in Choco, are the ones that have illegally taken control of land belonging to Afro-Colombians and who threaten Afro-Colombians trying to recover their land, " he insists.

Brutal evictions

The ways in which Afro-Colombians have been forced off their land in Choco and in the Pacific region have not been remotely subtle.

"We told the paramilitaries not to come on our land, but they continued to move around the perimeters and intrude on our territory," says Mr Yajaira.

Dozens of peasant farmers who have refused to sell or relinquish their holdings, or who are community representatives, have been murdered.

One recent case is Ualberto Hoyos, a family farmer and community leader, who was murdered by two presumed paramilitaries on 14 October in an execution-style killing with a shot through the head.

No sanctions

Stepping up the pressure on the communities, human rights organisations that defend Afro-Colombian rights have also begun to be targeted.

In September an ICJPC field worker was kidnapped.

"It is complicated to dismantle [the paramilitaries]," says Luc Gerar, president of Tribeca Partners, a private equity firm in Bogota.

"They have a lot of connections. Often, the police or the army trained them. Some are ex-police and ex-army. They have a lot of money and weapons."

Mr Rueda says this situation is a reflection of the immunity enjoyed by the paramilitaries.

"The businessmen continue in the area, cutting down the fruit from the palm trees and extracting the oil. They continue to exploit Afro-Colombian lands that do not belong to them," he claims.

"In 99% of the cases there has been no clarification, no punishing of the guilty, no sanctions."
Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/business/7784117.stm

Published: 2008/12/21 16:49:48 GMT
[[b]Submitted by Hemp4Fuel[/b]]

Malaysia doubles 2008 biodiesel export forecast

Wed, 22 Oct 2008 11:39:44 -0700

Malaysia doubles 2008 biodiesel export forecast
By Ooi Tee Ching
bt@nstp.com.my

http://www.btimes.com.my/Current_News/BTIMES/Industries/Commodities/20081022005407/Article/

MALAYSIA has raised its 2008 biodiesel export forecast to 200,000 tonnes, more than double that of last year's 95,013 tonnes.

"Export of biodiesel is picking up in volume and speed. The spread between the selling price of palm methyl ester and the feedstock is allowing biodiesel producers to make some money," said Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Datuk Peter Chin.

"So far, we have shipped out some 128,000 tonnes (of biodiesel). If the spread holds, biodiesel exports should continue at the current robust pace. We could possibly more than double (the number) from last year," he told Business Times in a telephone interview yesterday.

Earlier, the minister had estimated methyl ester (biodiesel) exports to grow by one-and-a-half times from last year.

The Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) said Malaysia exported 128,527 tonnes of biodiesel in the first nine months of this year.

Yesterday, the third-month benchmark crude palm oil price traded at RM1,652 while crude oil on Nymex traded at US$74 (RM261.22) per barrel.

Meanwhile, at the Oils and Fats International Congress (OFIC) 2008 in Kuala Lumpur yesterday, Deputy Plantation Industries and Commodities Minister Senator Kohilan Pillay said that of the 91 biodiesel licences issued to date, 15 plants with a combined 1.6 million tonnes capacity have been built. Out of that, five are actively producing and exporting methyl ester.

Organised by the Malaysian Oil Scientists' and Technologists' Association (Mosta) and publisher Oils and Fats International, OFIC 2008 carries the theme "Global Availability and Sustainability of Oils and Fats".

Also present was Malaysian Biodiesel Association deputy president Unnikrishnan Ramachandran Unnithan.

"We are optimistic of achieving the 200,000-tonne target as many biodiesel exporters have, since June, ramped up production," he told Business Times.

Unnikrishnan, who is also Carotino Sdn Bhd executive director, said his company's biodiesel plants are currently operating at 90 per cent capacity.

Its plants in Johor have a capacity to produce 180,000 tonnes of biodiesel per year, both summer and winter grade.

"Most of our biodiesel shipment go to Europe, although we also sell small quantities to Asia Pacific," he said.

Process engineer Desmet Ballestra (M) Sdn Bhd, one of the 65 exhibitors at OFIC 2008, said it is getting more jobs to build specialty fats and oleochemical plants.

"In the last two years, the focus was biodiesel. However this year, it is specialty fats and oleochemicals due to excess biodiesel capacity in Malaysia," said Desmet Ballestra managing director Khoo Kiak Kern.

"Existing plants only needed to ramp up production to leverage on the spread between biodiesel selling price and feedstock cost," he added.
[[b]Submitted by Hemp4Fuel[/b]]

Algae Biodiesel Company Opens First Large Greenhouse

Tue, 21 Oct 2008 11:40:43 -0700

Algae Biodiesel Company Opens First Large Greenhouse
Jason Mick (Blog) - October 21, 2008 11:10 AM

http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=13252

GreenFuel experimented with growing algae in tubes and bags at its Arizona pilot farm. While most of its competitors are sticking to these methods, GreenFuels has developed a closely-guarded greenhouse technologies which grows algae at higher yields and an automated system to harvest the crop. It will be debutting this setup at a commercial scale plant in Spain, to be complete in 2011. (Source: PetroAlgae)
Algae company's harvest will make biodiesel, nutritious livestock feed

Many in the alternative fuels industry agree that algae is where the mid-range future of the biodiesel industry. While fuels such as ethanol and cellulosic ethanol may prevail in the short term, algae is seen as the final stepping stone before full synthetic gasoline production. This value is due to algae's ability to grow rich long chain hydrocarbons. When algae is genetically engineered, it can produce large amounts of oil that is essentially diesel grade.

The big question with algae tech is not whether it will arrive, but when it will arrive. DailyTech had previously followed Cambridge, Mass. based GreenFuel Technologies' effort to bring its specially bred algae to the market. The company, founded by MIT graduates, had built a pilot farm in Arizona, previously. By growing algae in tubes, it found that algae would get optimal sun exposure. Its only problem was that it grew too much algae, blocking out light, and eventually killing part of the crop.

Now GreenFuel is taking its experience and has become the first algae company to announce a profitable business deal and the construction of a commercial scale growth facility. Spain's Aurantia, a leading alternative energy investment firm, has agreed to pay GreenFuels $92M to build a 100 hectacre (250 acre) algae farm. The farm will produce 25,000 tons of biomass yearly.

GreenFuel, which recently celebrated its 7th anniversary, already has a 100 square-meter prototype greenhouse operating at the site in Spain. GreenFuel ditched the growing tubes, opting for a top-secret tubeless proprietary growing process, one which includes automated harvesting. Thus far the company has declined to reveal the secretive workings of this new design.

It has, however, announced its intention to scale the production up quickly. It plans to have a 1,000 square-meter installation online by the end of the year. The full farm is scheduled to be completed by 2011.

The plant will take carbon dioxide emissions from the nearby Holcim cement plant near Jerez, Spain and use it to increase algae yields. This will cut down on Holcim cement plant near Jerez, Spain, almost 10 percent of the factory's output. This will help the factory meet tougher emissions standards.

The developers are in the process of selecting which strains of algae to grow. Certain strains are optimized for biodiesel production; bred to produce extra oil. Other strains produce extra nutrients like protein and make for more nutritious animal feed.

CEO Simon Upfill-Brown acknowledges that the field is full of overly optimistic visions, but insists his company is firmly grounded in reality and a series of successful trials. He states, "Some people are making clearly outrageous claims. We're at the stage where we can say we are pretty comfortable and very optimistic that we're getting all the way there in phases."

One trouble spot for the upcoming farm is falling gas prices. With gas low, it may be harder for the farm's biodiesel production to be economically competitive. This was cited as the resaon for rival Imperium Renewables' delay of its plan to launch a smaller algae farm in Hawaii.
[[b]Submitted by Hemp4Fuel[/b]]

GreenFuel Tech opens algae-growing greenhouse

Mon, 20 Oct 2008 09:01:00 -0700

http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-10070678-54.html?tag=mncol
By: Martin LaMonica

GreenFuel Technologies on Tuesday is expected to announce what few in the algae fuel business can claim--a paying customer.

The Cambridge, Mass.-based company detailed a multi-year deal worth $92 million to build greenhouses that grow algae, which can be harvested for vegetable oil to make biodiesel or to make animal feed.

The project developer is Spain's Aurantia, which specializes in renewable energy. GreenFuel executives have said they are pursuing other deals with large polluters, such as utilities and heavy industry, with other project developers in different parts of the world.

The deal, which has been rumored for months, is a milestone for the 7-year-old company with roots at MIT and for the budding algae industry overall.

GreenFuel Technologies originally tested its algae-growing process in plastic bags with an Arizona utility. That project ran into trouble when the cost of harvesting the algae biomass was too high.

Its greenhouse design--which the company will not discuss in detail--grows algae without tubes and uses an automated harvesting system, according to CEO Simon Upfill-Brown. The water in which the algae grows is recycled.

GreenFuel and Aurantia now have a 100 square-meter prototype operating. It's next stage, slated for completion in about a year, is a 1000-meter installation.

It hopes that by 2011, it will have a full-scale operation, which will take up 100 hectares, or about 250 acres, Upfill-Brown said.

A 100-hectare algae farm would consume about 50,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year--about 10 percent of its the cement factory's annual emissions--and grow about 25,000 tones of algae biomass.

Cement makers are some of the largest emitters of carbon dioxide. With the farm, Holcim will get positive PR and take a step toward mandatory emissions cuts, Upfill-Brown said.

He expects that the project developers will choose different strains of algae to optimize for different end products, be it oil or feed.

In the past year, there have several companies formed to make algae for oils for fuels or pharmaceuticals. But thus far, there aren't any companies producing algae for fuel at commercial scale.

"Some people are making clearly outrageous claims. We're at the stage where we can say we are pretty comfortable and very optimistic that we're getting all the way there in phases," he said.

On top of technical challenges, a potential problem with algae ventures is falling petroleum prices, which make it harder to be cost competitive. Struggling biodiesel maker Imperium Renewables is said to have delayed an algae farming venture in Hawaii.

Upfill-Brown said the company expects to raise a series C round of funding in the next month to further develop its greenhouse. It intends to seek out other project developer customers like Aurantia as customers.

Updated at 4:55 a.m. PT with corrected figure for amount of carbon dioxide consumed by a 100 hectare algae farm.

Source: Cnet News
[[b]Submitted by hempistry[/b]]

Man's plans for biodiesel closer to reality

Thu, 16 Oct 2008 08:14:58 -0700

Man's plans for biodiesel closer to reality
Thursday, October 16, 2008 | 7:08 PM
Plan to build plant headed before zoning board
By Rebecca Trylch

HURON COUNTY (WJRT) -- (10/16/08)--One man's plan to fuel the future by making biodiesel is moving closer to reality.

Over the last few weeks, the owner of Huron Biofuels bought the property in Huron County's Oliver Township, where the future plant will sit.

It's on Moore Road just south of Pigeon Road.

Thursday marked a big step in the plan to make the soybean processing plant a reality.

That's when the Oliver Township zoning board will decide whether to rezone the Huron Biofuels site from its current designation of agricultural to industrial.

Right now, the 55-acre parcel of land that the plant will sit on is a farm field. The site was chosen for a number of reasons: First, the Thumb Area is full of soybeans -- the key ingredient in the business.

Also, the land is right next to railroad tracks and a busy two-lane highway. That highway could be seeing construction equipment moving into town as early as next spring.

That's when the folks at Huron Biofuels want to start construction on the $65 million plant.

When complete, the plant would make two products: soybean oil and soybean meal.

The meal is used as animal feed, while the oil would be used to make biodiesel. But before any of that happens, the company has to get zoning board approval.

"We want to work with the township, with the local community, you know, every way we can," said Huron Biofuels CEO Bill Moran.

"The purpose of the hearing is to allow people to come out, ask questions, become -- hopefully become -- satisfied that this is a good thing."

Now that Huron Biofuels officially owns the site, community members are starting to decide whether they like the idea of a biodiesel plant moving into town.

"(It's) good that they would be bringing new jobs," said Barbara Faupel. "I guess I just wish it was somewhere else."

Faupel would be one of the plant's new neighbors.

"I'm mainly concerned about the noise and the visual appearance of it, and the traffic," she said.

But the company's owner says he picked the site with those concerns in mind.

He says the plant shouldn't be any noisier than nearby grain elevators, and says farm traffic already travels those roads.

Nearby business owner Mark Krueger says he can't wait for the plant to open.

"We could use a shot in the arm. Our county is hurting," he said. "We have the wind farm outside of town here, and this area just seems to be going right now for alternative energy."

Click here for more Mid-Michigan and Flint news
(Copyright ©2008 WJRT-TV/DT. All Rights Reserved.)

[[b]Submitted by Hemp4Fuel[/b]]