A company planning to make biodiesel from tallow and recycled vegetable oils in southern Quebec has picked up an $800,000 federal loan toward its start-up costs.
QFI Biodiesel will use the funds from the federal Community Adjustment Fund (CAF) to start its plant at St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, southeast of Montreal, the government said Monday.
QFI plans to produce fuel made from animal- and vegetable-based recycled oils such as soy, canola and sunflower, to sell biodiesel on the Quebec, Canadian and international markets.
The company plans to hire 19 full-time workers to carry out the “ambitious” project, the government said.
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The two-year, $1 billion CAF goes to support projects in and around smaller one-industry communities hit by job losses and lack of employment alternatives due to the global recession.
Projects funded through the CAF, delivered in Quebec by Canada Economic Development, must be completed by March 31, 2011. Eligible projects must be able to start “quickly” and contribute to creating and maintaining jobs in the “immediate term.”
QFI was already approved last July for production incentives under the federal ecoEnergy for Biofuels program, and previously for support under the ecoAgriculture Biofuels Capital Initiative, for which its eligible project costs come to $7.49 million.
The company’s St-Jean-sur-Richelieu plant, which first registered with ecoABC in October 2007 and was originally expected to be commissioned in October 2009, has a nameplate production capacity of 40 million litres per year.
About seven per cent of the project’s estimated costs were expected to be raised through new investment from area farmers.
QFI, according to the ecoABC program site, picked up a favourable environmental assessment decision for its project in September 2008.
“This financial assistance constitutes a real investment in the social and economic development of the Monteregie and one that is sure to help position the region advantageously in this growth sector, both here and around the world,” MP Denis Lebel, the minister of state for Canada Economic Development, said in the government’s release.
