Farmers Become Guardians of Ethanol Plant
A group of farmer-owned ethanol plants in Minnesota, Iowa and Nebraska have teamed up become the guardians of a former VeraSun facility in Janesville, Minn.
Guardian Energy is a joint venture between ethanol plants in Little Falls, Benson, Claremont, and Winthrop, Minnesota as well as Mason City, Iowa and Minden, Nebraska that last week closed on the purchase of the 100 million gallon per year ethanol plant in Janesville.
“Drawing on the experience of its member plants, Guardian Energy is rapidly working to bring the facility on line this fall,” said interim CEO and Board President Randall Doyal. “We are actively recruiting and interviewing candidates from across the region to fill more than 45 new jobs. We will work closely with local farmers to create a new, value-added market for their corn, as well as with other local suppliers who are already at work completing the plant, putting the finishing touches on the plant site, and bringing in supplies necessary to operate the facility.” Doyal also serves as CEO of Al-Corn Clean Fuel.
Guardian Energy LLC is the cooperative effort six midwestern farmer owned ethanol plants which have a philosophy that the economic benefits of producing ethanol should stay in the local communities and that has been key to the success of each of the member plants involved in Guardian Energy. Guardian Energy negotiated with the banks holding the Janesville facility, and their negotiations led to the successful close and transfer of ownership to Guardian Energy on September 23.
The six facilities comprising Guardian Energy are Al-Corn Clean Fuel, Central Minnesota Ethanol, Chippewa Valley Ethanol Company, Golden Grain Energy, Heartland Corn Products, and KAPPA Ethanol.
5 Comments »
Kenz
Yahoo!! It is good to see the plant survive and that local owners will have a hand in saving it.
We need to see more distributed ownership of fuels.
We have been at the hands of a few major oil companies for too long.
We need to see more alternatives at the fueling station.
Ethanol, biodiesel, hybrid, flex fuel, electric,cng all need to be available to the consumer.
Big Oil needs some competition. OPEC needs some competition.
If we have another oil shortage or a spike in price people will be glad they have a choice at the pump.
Now all we need to do is convince auto makers to increase the number of flex fuel vehicles that they produce and have more fueling stations put in E85 or blender pumps..
PabloKoh
I never understood when the American taxpayer bailed out Chevy and Chrysler why an alternative fuel mandate was not required. We will save your failure of a company only if in 2 years you have every one of your cars flex-fuel and easily convertible to cng.” It is good that these local companies bought the plant. All too often it is the oil companies who purchase these plants for pennies on the dollar, sending the profits flowing directly to the Caymans.
Commodities Broker | Drumbeat: September 28, 2009 | Commodities Options | Commodities Futures | Commodities Prices
[...] Farmers Become Guardians of Ethanol Plant A group of farmer-owned ethanol plants in Minnesota, Iowa and Nebraska have teamed up become the guardians of a former VeraSun facility in Janesville, Minn. [...]
Drumbeat: September 28, 2009 | Climate Vine
[...] Farmers Become Guardians of Ethanol Plant A group of farmer-owned ethanol plants in Minnesota, Iowa and Nebraska have teamed up become the guardians of a former VeraSun facility in Janesville, Minn. [...]
Drumbeat: September 28, 2009 | Bear Market Investments
[...] Farmers Become Guardians of Ethanol Plant A group of farmer-owned ethanol plants in Minnesota, Iowa and Nebraska have teamed up become the guardians of a former VeraSun facility in Janesville, Minn. [...]
Comments RSS feed — TrackBack URI
Leave a Comment