Canadian company Woodland Biofuels has announced a $1.35bn (C$1.83bn) investment to establish a carbon-negative renewable natural gas (RNG) plant and an ultra-green hydrogen facility at the Port of South Louisiana.
This project, which is said to include the world's largest carbon-negative RNG facility in its first phase, will utilise waste biomass to produce sustainable biofuel.
The new facility will be located at the Globalplex multimodal facility at the Port of South Louisiana and is expected to remove hundreds of thousands of tonnes (t) of CO₂ from the atmosphere annually.
Phase one alone is projected to eliminate 210,000t of CO₂ each year, with phase two removing approximately 660,000t annually.
Woodland Biofuels anticipates that the initiative will become one of the largest CO₂ removal projects globally.
The first phase of commercial operations is due to commence in 2028.
Louisiana Economic Development (LED) has offered Woodland Biofuels an incentives package valued at more than $250m to support the project in Reserve, Louisiana.
The package includes performance-based grants and other economic development programmes for infrastructure improvements, alongside the comprehensive workforce development solutions of LED FastStart.
Woodland Biofuels CEO Greg Nuttall said: “Woodland is thrilled to announce that we plan to build, right here at the Port of South Louisiana, the world’s largest carbon negative RNG facility, followed by the world’s largest carbon negative ultra-green hydrogen plant.”
LED secretary Susan Bourgeois said: “Woodland Biofuels’ project would bring high-paying jobs to the great people of St. John the Baptist Parish for years to come. The state looks forward to working with the company to bring this project to completion.”
In July, Viridi Energy, an RNG producer, entered into a 20-year supply agreement with Énergir.
The deal will see Viridi deliver 650,000 gigajoules of RNG annually from its facilities in the US to Énergir, a major energy distributor in Quebec and Vermont.
