GreenShift's Mean Green BioFuels Announces 30 Million Gallon Biodiesel Plant in Western Tennessee Business Wire - December 5, 2005 9:11 AM (EDT)
MOUNT ARLINGTON, N.J., Dec 05, 2005 (BUSINESS WIRE) -- GreenShift Corporation's (OTC Bulletin Board:GSHF) portfolio company Mean Green BioFuels Corporation ("Mean Green") today announced its plans to build a 30 million gallon per year biodiesel production facility in western Tennessee. The new Tennessee facility will be one of five such facilities that Mean Green intends to build, own and operate commencing in 2006.
Details regarding the new Tennessee facility will be disclosed later this week in anticipation of a press conference that will be held in Tennessee on Friday, December 9, 2005, to formally announce Mean Green's plans.
Mean Green intends to finance, build and operate five 20 to 60 million gallon per year biodiesel production facilities in the eastern U.S., where it will utilize its many patent-pending and proprietary oil recovery technologies to reduce America's dependence on foreign oil by producing high quality biodiesel fuels.
Recently cited by President Bush as "one of our nation's most promising alternative fuel sources," biodiesel is a clean burning alternative fuel that contains no petroleum. It can be blended at any level with petroleum diesel to create a biodiesel blend, it can be used in diesel engines with little or no modifications, and it is simple to use, biodegradable, nontoxic, and essentially free of sulfur and aromatics.
Over 37 billion gallons of petroleum diesel are used for domestic transportation each year in the U.S. The total demand for diesel fuel approaches 50 billion gallons per year when construction, farming and other off-road uses are considered. The current production of biodiesel in the U.S. is less than 100 million gallons per year leaving a considerable demand for the renewable fuel.
"Mean Green's business model is distinct in several ways," said David Cantrell, chief executive officer of Mean Green. "The most important distinction is that our model is based on our use of four oil conversion feedstocks whereas most biodiesel models rely only on one oil."
The Mean Green model is based on the production of biodiesel out of the following sources:
-- soy bean oil;
-- animal fats procured from rendering operations;
-- corn oil extracted from ethanol facilities using Mean Green's breakthrough corn oil extraction technology; and
-- animal fats derived from dissolved air flotation wastewater sludges using the proprietary technologies of Mean Green's sister company, GreenShift Industrial Design Corporation.
"Our investment in Mean Green is not just about helping the environment," said Kevin Kreisler, GreenShift's chairman and chief executive officer. "It is about reducing America's dependence on foreign oil, re-energizing American agriculture, and creating substantial wealth -- both for GreenShift's shareholders and for the local economies in the cities and states we select for construction of our biodiesel facilities."
The new Mean Green biodiesel production facility planned for western Tennessee can be expected to initially create more than 100 new local jobs. At a conservative $2.30 per gallon, the new Mean Green facility can be expected to generate about $69 million in revenue per year once operational.
"We believe that America's agricultural sector is filled with highly-skilled, hard-working and creative people with tremendous potential," added Kreisler. "Biodiesel production provides this work force with an important and timely way to have a significant impact on the state of their regional economies and the overall state of the environment by reducing the emission of harmful greenhouse gases. We are proud to have the opportunity to invest in American agriculture and we look forward to bringing our plans to fruition in western Tennessee."
Mean Green BioFuels' Technologies
-- Oil Extraction From Dry Mill Ethanol Facilities
Mean Green's corn oil extraction process redirects an internal waste stream in dry mill ethanol facilities through Mean Green's proprietary and patent pending extraction systems where crude corn oil is extracted and then prepared for shipment offsite for further refining. Mean Green will purchase and sell this oil on the basis of wholesale and retail prices, thereby stimulating near term cash flows pending the initiation of operations at its planned new biodiesel facility.
Mean Green will install the oil extraction equipment in dry mill ethanol production facilities at no charge to client ethanol producers in exchange for first rights of refusal for the oil extracted. Mean Green plans to pay participating ethanol facilities a premium for the oil extract, which will allow for up to 25% in additional profit to the participating ethanol companies with no capital investment.
-- Oil Recovery from Poultry and Livestock Wastewater Sludge
About 100 million pigs, 35 million cattle, 1.6 billion turkeys, and 8 billion chickens are slaughtered and processed each year in the United States. The USDA requires facilities that process these meats to use large volumes of clean water to continuously rinse the meats as they are cut and packaged. The derivative large volumes of water contain extremely high levels of protein and fat. These nutrients are removed from the wastewater using conventional but highly efficient wastewater processing methods. This results in a cleaned wastewater and a concentrated sludge, which is called Dissolved Air Flotation ("DAF") sludge. The poultry industry alone generates in excess of 2.5 billion pounds or more than 63,000 tanker loads per year of DAF sludge. The conventional practice in the industry is to transport and dispose DAF sludge through land application.
Mean Green's sister company, GreenShift Industrial Design Corporation ("GIDC"), has a proprietary DAF sludge processing technology that effectively reduces the volume of DAF sludge by 80% while recovering the majority of the animal fats contained in the sludge. This fat can be cost-effectively converted into biodiesel fuel.
GIDC intends to install its DAF processing systems at qualified processing facilities for no up front cost in return for fixed annuities equal to a discount to their current gross disposal costs and GIDC's agreement to purchase the refined fats extracted from the DAF sludge. GIDC will then sell these fats to Mean Green for conversion into biodiesel. GIDC estimates that the benefit of its technology for an average sized meat processing facility will be about $400,000 per year.
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