The partnership also includes a takeoff agreement for the ethanol production byproduct and animal feed component, dried distillers grain products (DDGS), by CFS.
A producer of renewable energy solutions and a global leader in the production of high-purity specialty alcohols and solvents, Greenfield Global will take corn for its Winnebago, Minnesota, ethanol plant from CFS.
Greenfield Global only acquired the facility in October 2020, its first asset in the US, and the company reckons it will be ready to start the production of renewable ethanol from autumn this year. The former Corn Plus facility, which had been shuttered since September 2019, has a capacity of 48 million gallons of ethanol per year. The output will mainly go towards low-carbon fuels.
The Canadian producer bought the plant through a receivership process, and the group said at the time of the acquisition that the addition of a US based-corn ethanol facility provided it with a larger and more diverse geographic footprint from which to operate.
Headquartered in Truman, Minnesota, CFS works with over 4,000 producers in southern Minnesota and northern Iowa. The group, which is involved in diverse businesses and services from grain marketing and merchandising, to crop production and seed, to feed manufacturing and producer financing, said it will begin buying corn immediately for harvest and beyond for delivery to the Greenfield plant in Winnebago.
The USDA predicts corn use for ethanol will increase in 2021-22, based on expectations of higher US motor gasoline consumption, according to projections in its May World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report.
Founded in 1989, Greenfield Global is the largest ethanol producer in Canada and owns and operates four ethanol distilleries, five specialty chemical manufacturing and packaging plants, and three next-generation biofuel and renewable energy R&D centers in Canada and the US.