Noble Americas is running tests at the ethanol plant in South Bend as the company prepares to restart production at the facility at 3201 W. Calvert St. on the city’s southwestern edge. SBT Photo/SANTIAGO FLORES
SOUTH BEND — The ethanol plant on the city's southwest side is coming back from the dead.
Noble Americas, the company that bought the shuttered facility last year and set to work retrofitting it, is now testing the plant to ensure it's ready for production again. The company sent a notice to city officials a few weeks ago to notify them of the impending startup.
Chris Fielding, assistant executive director for the South Bend Department of Community Investment, said Noble Americas' goal is to be shipping the corn-based fuel additive by the middle of December.
"We're certainly excited to see the first truck of ethanol go out of that place in the coming weeks," Fielding said.
It will be the first ethanol made at the plant since New Energy, the facility's former owner, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy two years ago.
At the time, it looked like the 30-year-old plant might have reached the end of its usefulness, especially when liquidators bought it at a bankruptcy auction.
Noble Americas not only saved the plant from the scrap heap by purchasing it from the liquidators, it also has invested heavily in the facility to make it more efficient and able to withstand the ups and downs of the ethanol industry.
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