Alberta's first large-scale biofuel refinery planned

A $400-million integrated biodiesel and ethanol refinery the first complex of its kind in North America will be built in central Alberta.
Led by Dominion Energy Services, LLC a Florida-based group with pioneering ties to Calgary's natural gas marketing sector investors that include $45-billion US private equity fund The Carlyle Group LLC and affiliate Riverstone Renewable Energy Infrastructure Fund I, LP said Monday they have finalized plans for the facility.
"There's nothing like this, that we know of, in North America," said Dominion Energy president and CEO Curtis Chandler, who helped to build the Edson-area Alberta Hub natural gas storage facility. "We're coming home."
The Alberta bio-refinery will include a canola crushing plant, a biodiesel refinery and an ethanol refinery, each capable of producing up to 100 million U.S. gallons, or 374 million litres, per year of product. Construction is expected to begin in the first quarter of 2007 at one of three short-listed sites.
"It's the only facility that has the three-pronged approach to it," Chandler added, noting feedstock for the canola crushing plant and ethanol facility will come from local growers. The biodiesel refinery will utilize canola oil from its sister plant or, alternatively, imported palm or soya oil, Chandler said.
"The production from the Alberta facility will help meet national and provincial renewable fuel targets," he said.
Along with the production of biodiesel and ethanol, the complex will capture its carbon dioxide emissions, which will be sold for oilfield production enhancement.
The project will mark the first large-scale biofuels plant in Alberta and when completed will be the largest bio-refinery in North America. In Red Deer, Alta., Permolex Ltd. operates a 12-million-litre-per-year ethanol plant while Calgary-based Husky Energy Inc. has built a $110-million, 130-million-litre-per-year ethanol plant in Lloydminster, Sask.
Alberta Agriculture Minister Doug Horner noted the "world-class" Dominion plant follows the provincial government's recent, $239-million over five years initiative to boost biofuels production. The province will provide a 14-cent per litre production credit to the facility.
The plant will create approximately 400 construction jobs and employ 90 people full time, with 200 indirect jobs, once it is completed in early to mid 2008.
The majority stake will be held by New York-based Carlyle and Riverstone, a group known for the former Reagan, Clinton and Bush U.S. presidential administration staffers on its payroll. Carlyle and Riverstone, a $6.5-billion US private equity fund, is also no stranger to Alberta, having purchased in March the natural gas storage assets of Calgary-based EnCana Corp. in a $1.5-billion US deal that included the 125 billion-cubic-foot AECO Hub.
"We see a receptive environment to locate a major bio-fuel investment in Alberta," said Riverstone managing director Stephen Schaefer from New York. "We also anticipate continued opportunities to work together with Dominion Energy. We believe renewable energy will play an increasing role in delivering the energy needs of North America," Schaefer added.