Ethanol technology firm D3MAX and Ace Ethanol LLC started construction work at on a new commercial-scale corn kernel fiber-to-ethanol production plant in Wisconsin, a joint press release announced Wednesday. 

Located at an existing Ace Ethanol facility in Stanley, WI, the project will integrate D3MAX’s corn kernel-to-fiber processing technology with Ace’s corn dry mill. 

“We are employing a fully-integrated design at the Ace plant which will make the facility one of the most energy efficient ethanol plants in the U.S. with the highest ethanol yield per bushel,” Mark Yancey, chief technology officer at D3MAX, said in a statement. “The combined facilities will be so efficient that the energy use of the new integrated facility will be approximately the same as the current Ace ethanol plant.”

According to the companies, the D3MAX process is advantageous to ethanol producers because it is the only kernel fiber-to-ethanol process that does not necessitate having an independent engineer re-certify the cellulosic ethanol production for every 500,000 gal of output. The new site will also include Whitefox Technologies’ membrane-based ethanol recovery technology 

“We are excited to make this announcement and begin the construction of what we believe will be the new benchmark for the industry,” said Yancey. 

The release did not detail when the firms expect the construction project to reach completion. 

Ace Ethanol’s existing plant in Stanley is capable of producing 50 million gal of ethanol, 118,000 tn of DDGS, 8000 tn of distillers’ corn oil, and 65,000 tn of carbon dioxide, and features a storage capacity of 2 million bushels. 

For more news headlines, articles, and equipment reviews, visit our Equipment Zones