A new distribution center slated for South Portland is expected to decrease the cost of biodiesel for consumers, and could have the city of South Portland considering using biodiesel to fuel its fleet of diesel buses and trucks.
Frontier Energy will construct the center in conjunction with Turners Island LLC, the Maine Public Utilities Commission and thanks to a $75,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Energy.
Joel Glatz, manager of Frontier Energy, wrote the grant application for the funds and said the center has been needed for a long time. It would be located on property leased from Turners Island LLC, a rail-marine cargo terminal on South Portland’s waterfront.
Biofuel is usually vegetable oil or soybean oil that can be mixed with petroleum to make biodiesel, an equivalent of diesel fuel or home heating oil that is 80 percent fossil fuel.
Biofuel and petroleum are currently shipped individually by rail or truck and stored in bulk at Frontier Energy’s location in South China. The biofuel comes from the Midwest and the petroleum from cargo terminals such as Turners Island in South Portland. They are blended in South China distributed to customers in the mid-coast area as biodiesel for cars and trucks, and BioHeat, the company’s biofuel/petroleum blend of home heating oil.
Glatz said shipping large amounts of liquid is expensive and having the biofuel and petroleum shipped to the same spot would save a lot of money on transportation.
“It just makes a lot more sense to have the biofuel close to where the petroleum is,” Glatz said.
Glatz said some fuel distributors such as Independence Fuel in Durham and Guerin Oil in Gorham currently make biodiesel and BioHeat available in southern parts of the state, but a distribution center in South Portland would make it cheaper and much more readily available to other distributors in the area.
Tom Meyers, transportation director for the city of South Portland, said the city would be interested in a cleaner, more environmentally friendly fuel alternative to fossil fuels.
“But the bottom line will always be what is the cost,” he said. The switch to biodiesel for South Portland’s fleet of buses and trucks would be a public policy decision made by the City Council, Meyers said, because the switch would be an environmental stewardship measure rather than cost savings.
South Portland has considered the use of biodiesel before. Public Works Director Dana Anderson said when the city was considering the purchase of the Durastone property earlier this year for use as a public works site, one of three fuel tanks was going to be for biodiesel.
Anderson said since that purchase fell through the idea of switching to biodiesel was dropped because of the lack of infrastructure to support it and the cost of shipping.
“It’s not on the front burner yet,” Anderson said. “But it may be the way of the future.”
He said he hadn’t heard about the plans for the wholesale biodiesel distribution center that will be located in South Portland, but said he would bring the prospect up in a Nov. 7 meeting of department heads about fuel costs.
The distribution center has to be completed by next October, but Glatz said an intermediate location in South Portland would be in place by the first of the year. He would not disclose the location of the intermediate location before he had signed a lease.
Frontier Energy, created by Joel Glatz in 2002, was the first fuel dealer in Maine to offer biofuel and petroleum fuel blends for home heating purposes and diesel engines to their customers.
The prevalence of biodiesel for the home and automobiles has increased in recent years. According to Glatz, the main reason is federal policies encouraging the use of the product and giving what is called “blenders credit” to distributors of the product. The purpose of the credit is to ultimately encourage consumption by reducing the cost to consumers and for distributors to offset the cost of new infrastructure.
Roger Hale Jr., manager of Turners Island LLC, said the company had never even considered bringing biodiesel through their terminal, but Glatz came to them with a “good game plan.”
Glatz would lease the property from Turners Island LLC, who will help pay to build the center and would be switching rail cars in and out for Frontier Energy. He said biodiesel would not be a high-volume cargo, but it is “up and coming.”
Hale Jr. said his marine construction company Fore River Dock & Dredge would begin to purchase biodiesel to fuel his workboats and barges.
Recent successes for the increased use of biodiesel in Maine include its use to heat state offices, capitol building and governor’s mansion, and L.L. Bean’s switch to biodiesel as the fuel for its fleet of trucks.
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