Colorado startup biofuels company Sundrop Fuels Inc. plans to build its first biofuels production plant in Louisiana at a cost of $450 million to $500 million.
Several weeks ago Louisville-based Sundrop revealed that it agreed to purchase a 1,200-acre site for the refinery in Rapides Parish, near Alexandria, La. The plant is expected to employ 150 workers.
The refinery will use forest waste and hydrogen from natural gas to make as much as 50 million gallons a year of what Sundrop calls “the world’s first ready-to-use, renewable ‘green gasoline.’”
The company said that Louisiana officials provided performance-based incentives, and plant construction will be financed in part through the sale of state-tax-exempt “private activity bonds.”
Sundrop raised $175 Million in new investment last July, mostly from Chesapeake Energy. The company’s investors also include two of the world’s premier venture capital firms, Oak Investment Partners and Kleiner Perkins Caulfield & Byers.