Local company announces plans for ethanol plant
By Larry Meyer
Argus Observer
Wednesday, August 6, 2008 9:57 AM PDT
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| Nyssa’s Amalgamated Sugar plant may be the site of one of the area’s next ethanol plants. |
NYSSA — An area company has filed a notice of intent with the Oregon Department of Energy to build an ethanol production plant in Nyssa at the site of the vacated sugar beet processing plant.
Snake River Ethanol LLC — formed last fall — filed documents with the energy department regarding a facility that is expected to produce approximately 130 million gallons of ethanol per year along with agricultural co-product using corn and sugar as feedstock.
Amalgamated Sugar Company owns 80 percent of Snake River Ethanol LLC.
Feedstock would be brought in by rail and truck, and ethanol and co-products set to be shipped out by rail and truck. The company proposes to use a mix of heat sources including coal, natural gas and biomass to fire the plant.
Documents filed with the ODOE said the facility will be the first in the Northwest to employ highly efficient front-end fractionation technology that separates valuable germ and coarse bran from the corn endosperm prior to its fermentation. Germ can be sold to oil manufacturers and bran can be sold or used as a feedstock at the facility.
Documents from the ODOE said the notice of intent is not the application, but only a statement that applicants will submit a more detailed application. In the notice of intent, filed in July, Snake River Ethanol officials indicated they planned to submit an application this month.
The project requires a site certificate from the Oregon Energy Facility Siting Council, a statewide permit that includes a review by state agencies.
Amalgamated Sugar Company officials closed the Nyssa plant in 2005, upon completion of the 2004 harvest campaign. Then company President Ralph Burton cited excess capacity in the company and also in the sugar industry as key reasons for shutting down the process portion of the plant. The company continues to produce brown sugar at the plant.
“We are very excited about the proposed plant,” Nyssa City Manager Roberta Donovan said.
Donovan said the ethanol plant will be good for the community and the whole county.
“We’re just trying to be prepared,” Donovan said.
The Nyssa City Council has completed the annexation of the Amalgamated Sugar Company property into the city and is now working to amend the zoning to allow for the production of biofuels. The planning commission has acted upon the issue, and it now goes before the City Council.
“I had heard it looked pretty good,” Malheur County Commissioner Louis Wettstein said. “I didn’t know they were going ahead with it.”
The notice of intent is available for review at Nyssa City Hall, at the Oregon Department of Energy or the department’s Web site — www.oregon.gov/ENERGY/SITING/announce.shtml. Public comment will be accepted until Sept. 2 by the Oregon Department of Energy.
