Indiana to get $227M waste-to-energy plant

Tinton Falls, N.J.-based ForeverGreen Enterprises announced plans today to build a $227 million hazardous-waste-to-energy facility in Indiana by late 2010.

The plant is a result of a new joint venture between Celebration, Fla.-based International Power Group and ForeverGreen, a two-year-old startup that gasifies waste. The companies say they plan to collaborate on multiple waste-to-energy facilities across the globe. 

The initial 60-acre plant in LaFontaine, Ind., plans to intake 750 tons a day of industrial, chemical and medical waste, ForeverGreen Chief Executive Officer Michael Kelly told the Cleantech Group.

The plant expects to produce methanol and hydrogen, as well as a small amount of electricity to be fed back into the grid, Kelly said. He declined to reveal the output.

The waste-to-energy field is dominated by companies targeting municipal solid waste, Kelly said. But ForeverGreen is instead focusing on industrial, chemical and medical waste, which has a relatively high energy content and a high disposal cost, Kelly said.

"It’s starting to become competitive, but it’s still a relatively wide-open field," Kelly said. "These are materials none of us want in landfills, and I don’t think we want then burned in incinerators. Because of the high disposal cost, we can bring a large price
reduction."

The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that the U.S. generates 279 million metric tons a year. Companies have long treated that hazardous waste, but ForeverGreen is among a new group looking to use the waste to produce fuel and energy.

Construction on the Indiana plant is expected to start in January 2009 and last 22 months, Kelly said. That contract has not yet been awarded.

The plant is ForeverGreen’s first, although the private company has tested pilot projects and is looking to build waste-to-energy facilities in Mississippi, Pennsylvania, Florida and other states, as well as internationally, Kelly said.

The output of waste-to-energy facilities doesn’t vary greatly, Kelly said. Still, he said the plant will maximize efficiencies through International Power’s process to convert waste-heat to energy and ForeverGreen’s Progressive Molecular Dissociation, a gasification and gas clean-up process that breaks down waste by exposing it to progressively intense energy levels in controlled atmospheres.

Byproducts of the gasification process will include scrap steel and silicates, and eventually the plant expects to produce synthetic fuels, Kelly said.

ForeverGreen has been self-funded and expects to receive its first revenue from the facility. The company has about 50 employees but expects to reach 200 by the time the plant opens.

International Power is a waste-to-energy developer with offices in Sweden, Mexico, Egypt, London and New York City. Woodrow Crouch, chief executive officer of International Power, said the joint venture can help the company in its goal to break into the U.S. waste-to-energy market.

International Power Group plans to contribute $11.5 million for its 25-percent stake in the venture. ForeverGreen did not disclose its contribution, and the companies are now securing project financing for the remainder of the $227 million, Kelly said.

The companies are receiving some state and local government incentives for the plant but declined to reveal the value.