Biodiesel flowing in Hammond

A facility in Hammond has opened as the state's first producer of biodiesel fuel.

Evergreen Renewables started in mid-June making the alternative fuel from processed soybeans, company director Marc Wharton said.

"We've been working on it for a long time," Wharton said. "We're pretty excited we're up and running."

The plant has production capacity for 5 million gallons yearly of the fuel, which is typically blended with petroleum-based diesel to power vehicles and other diesel operated equipment.

A July 19 grand opening featuring Gov. Mitch Daniels is planned at the plant, located at Wolf Lake Terminals Inc., in the Wolf Lake Industrial Center, 3200 Sheffield Ave.

Omaha, Neb.-based Evergreen Renewables beat competitors to the punch to become Indiana's first biodiesel producer.

The Hammond plant ultimately will be dwarfed by the mammoth Louis Dreyfus factory planned for Claypool, Ind., near Warsaw, with capacity for 80 million gallons of biodiesel. The Dreyfus plant, expected to be the world's largest, is planned to be built in two phases over the next few years.

A third facility, Integrity Bio-Diesel, will open in August in Morristown in Shelby County.

The three facilities are good news for Indiana, which up to now had to import biodiesel from surrounding states, said Belinda Puetz, Indiana Soybean Board marketing director.

"All the product has been coming to us from Iowa, Illinois and Ohio," Puetz said.

Indiana uses 1.4 billion gallons of diesel each year, Puetz said. The product is sold to fuel terminals for use by gas stations, who purchase it to mix it with petroleum diesel in typical rations of between 1 percent and 20 percent, Puetz said.

The Hammond biofuel plant, employing about 12, is an extension of the privately owned Evergreen Renewables' vegetable-oil marketing and trading business, Wharton said.

"We've been looking at getting into biodiesel for several years," he said.

The company had looked at an Illinois site in 2001, based on a federal energy bill that eventually failed, Wharton said.

"The recent rise in energy prices and new federal tax legislation has made it that much more attractive in the past year" to start producing biofuel, Wharton said.

The Hammond site was chosen for its location, Wharton said.

"It's the optimal situation for inbound stocks and outbound marketing," Wharton said. The company had worked with Wolf Lake Terminals in the past, he added.