HIGH RIVER, Alta. – Alberta’s first biodiesel plant using animal fat and canola is expected to be in production by year end.
Western Biodiesel Inc. from Calgary has already started construction on an 1,800 sq. metre facility at High River. The company plans annual production of 19 million litres of biodiesel using mostly tallow from local rendering suppliers and some canola.
Additional refining will take place at the plant to ensure consistent quality.
“We have added some more processing sequences in our plant to prevent quality issues,” said technology manager Sebastien Berube.
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Glycerin, a biodiesel byproduct, will be burned to heat the plant or may be composted or fed to biodigesters.
About 10 percent of the feedstock will be canola.
“We’re mostly based on animal fat although we plan to use a little bit of canola,” said company president Dean Cockshutt.
The plant, on 2.5 acres, is beside a main highway and a rail line to move feedstock in and finished product out. An agreement has been signed with a clean fuels and petroleum company to market and move the product.
Expansion to 38 million litres is already under discussion because interest from potential buyers has been strong, said marketing vice-president Brian Harmes.
The High River facility will act as a wholesaler and will also have a cardlock system for selling fuel on site.
The plans have been discussed for about two years. Berube, a former aircraft maintenance engineer, had already constructed a biofuel pilot project and runs his own vehicle on biofuel.
Cockshutt, formerly with Encana Resources, and Harmes, helped Berube write a business plan and construction started ahead of other biodiesel plants that are still in the discussion stages.
“There’s a lot of talking and with more federal incentives coming there will be more actual construction, but we’re still on track to be the first,” said Berube.
The company still needs investors. Shares are available at 60 cents each and minimum investments of $25,000 are invited. Total startup capital for construction and production is $7.5 million with half raised so far.
Help may come in an announcement made April 23 by agriculture minister Chuck Strahl at the site. The federal government has promised $200 million until March 2011 to help individuals, co-operatives, partnerships and corporations borrow money for investment. Money is repaid from future profits.
The EcoAgriculture Biofuel Capital Initiative is open to projects that use agriculture feedstocks to produce biofuel and have agricultural producer equity at a minimum of five percent.
“It is necessary to have some incentives to develop a made-in-Canada industry,” said Strahl.
The government wants agricultural involvement and this most recent incentive should establish projects to meet the government mandate of five percent ethanol in gasoline in 2010 and two percent biodiesel blends by 2012.
“We have to move hard and fast if we are going to meet even our five percent targets,” the minister said.
