North Carolina's First Fuel Ethanol Plant Begins Operations

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Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--Over the weekend, privately held ethanol startup Clean Burn Fuels LLC (Raleigh, North Carolina) began producing its first batches of fuel ethanol at the company's new fuel ethanol plant southeast of Raeford, North Carolina.

Corn deliveries began in February, and after some minor construction setbacks, poor weather conditions, and other delays over the past two months, the plant is now cooking corn and will slowly ramp up production to the nameplate capacity of 60 million gallons per year. Touted as North Carolina's first ethanol plant, the facility will import corn feedstock by rail from surrounding corn-producing states and is expected to process 20 million bushels of corn annually.

The plant has an on-site corn-storage capacity of 1.5 million bushels. The facility utilizes KATZEN International Incorporated (Cincinnati, Ohio) licensed ethanol process technology. Clean Burn acted as general contractor, coordinating subcontractors and procuring equipment. Some engineering work and process piping installation was handled by Diversified Piping Systems LLC (Greer, South Carolina).

Construction on the estimated $100 million plant began in late 2007, and it took Clean Burn more than two years to get to this point of project development.

The plant is located roughly 5 miles southeast of Raeford, in the tiny town of Dundarrach, North Carolina, in Hoke County. Once fully operational, the plant is expected to create 100 jobs for the rural community.

Industrial Info's databases provide a comprehensive outline of all current development activities in the emerging alternative fuels market. Industrial Info's North American Ethanol Database covers 203 plants in operation and 358 plants under various development phases. Industrial Info's North American Biodiesel Database covers 153 operational plants and 72 plants under development. The North American Wood Fuel Pellet Database includes 59 operational plants producing greater than 25,000 tons annually, and 37 projects that are under way.

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