Sundrop Fuels, Inc., a gasification-based drop-in advanced biofuels company, has agreed to purchase 1,200 acres near Alexandria, La. for the construction and operation of the company’s first production facility. The Sundrop Fuels plant will reportedly use sustainable forest waste combined with hydrogen from clean-burning natural gas to produce up to 50 million gallons annually of renewable “green gasoline.”
Located in Rapides Parish a few miles outside of Alexandria, the Sundrop Fuels plant will cost $450 to $500 million to build. Louisiana also provided Sundrop Fuels with performance-based incentives for the facility, which is expected to employ 150.
Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal announced Sundrop Fuels’ site selection in a public event on November 22, saying that the state “is proud to take this leadership role by providing great careers for our people and by supplying innovative solutions for the energy bottleneck in our nation.”
Sundrop Fuels drop-in advanced biofuel is designed to cost as much or less than petroleum-based transportation fuels, creating considerable economic and environmental benefits while helping reduce the nation’s dependency on foreign oil. The company will use a gasification process to convert cellulosic feedstock into synthesis gas, which will then be made into clean, affordable bio-based “green gasoline” for use in combustion engines via the nation’s existing fuels distribution infrastructure.
Significant backing for Sundrop Fuels comes from Chesapeake Energy Corp., the largest producer of natural gas in northern Louisiana’s Haynesville Shale Field and second-largest producer in the nation. Chesapeake invested $155 million in Sundrop Fuels last summer.