Florida Hooters Operator Hopes to Find Profits in Waste Grease and Biofuels

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Privately held biofuels start-up FL Biofuels LLC (Fort Myers, Florida), which is co-owned by Dave Lageschulte, who operates 20 Florida Hooters restaurants, and the father/son team of Roy Benton II and III, has begun producing biodiesel at a brand new, $10 million facility near the State Farmers Market on Edison Avenue in Fort Myers, Florida.

The company just recently passed ASTM requirements for producing the fuel at B5 and B99 blending levels, and is preparing to ramp up production after some plant maintenance and tweaking of fuel recipes. Currently, only small batches of 6,000 gallons per day are being produced at the plant.

The plant will process waste grease from Lageschulte's Hooters restaurants, as well as collect spent yellow grease from the many surrounding eateries and hotels in Southeast Florida, which is a tourist destination. The plant has a nameplate production capacity of 4.2 million gallons per year, but will only produce half that amount until biodiesel market conditions improve. The increase to nameplate capacity is expected sometime before Christmas.

The Lee County government has expressed interest in buying the renewable fuel to run state vehicles, but FL Biofuels is hoping to land a deal to sell all it can produce to a large Southeast fuel distributor.

The 25,000-square-foot is located on 2.5 acres within the State Farmers Market complex, which is south of Edison Avenue and has truck and rail access to ship out finished product.

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