New biodiesel plant planned for Annawan

A new five million gallon biodiesel production facility is to be constructed in Annawan, Illinois, US by Patriot Holdings LLC. The company's board of directors has agreed upon a new subsidiary that will result in the plant's construction adjacent to the Patriot Renewable Fuels LLC ethanol plant. Biodiesel will be created from corn oil, which will be extracted from the 40 million bushels of corn that the company processes every year.

The Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity (DCEO) New Generation Biofuels Production Program will be helping with the cost and development of the new project. The new facility is building upon the corn oil extraction processes that Patriot Renewable Fuels began in 2011, according to the company's vice president and general manager, Rick Vondra. 

"We have been extracting increasing volumes of corn oil and selling it to other biodiesel producers, or for inclusion into livestock feed. By processing corn oil onsite we can reduce transportation, and marketing costs making Patriot’s biodiesel one of the most cost competitive producers in the biodiesel industry today," he continued.

The new facility will allow Patriot Renewable Fuels to produce two different types of fuel from the same amount of corn every year. It is intended that the biodiesel produced will be used for the trucking and agriculture industries, while the ethanol will continue to be provided for the automotive industry. The company will also maintain its production of dried distillers grain and soluble (DDGS), which is a livestock feed that is exported to countries throughout the Pacific and China.

Work on the new plant is due to begin next month (December 2013), with concrete and foundation works set to start. It is hoped that the facilities will be up and running before the end of 2014. A SUPERTM Process is planned for the plant, which will allow for a catalyst free, single stage, supercritical process, which will utilise Free Fatty Acids (FFA) to process feedstock. This will result in minimal to no loss in yield, resulting in huge savings.