Enviva buys South Carolina wood pellet plant

The company says that the acquisition will help meet the growing demand for biomass energy. The transaction took place 16 February; the amount payed for the facility was not disclosed.

Earlier in 2018, Enviva created a joint venture with The John Hancock Life Insurance Company called Enviva JV Development Company, this purchase is the first by the new company. The purpose of the joint venture is to ‘acquire, develop and construct’ wood pellet plants and deep-water marine terminals in the South-eastern United States.

The facility, called the Greenwood plant, was owned by The Navigator Company, a Portuguese paper and pulp company. Enviva says that it intends to invest in the plant to enhance its operational efficiency and add more emissions control equipment. Following these changes (which are still subject to the necessary permits), the company expects the plant to reach a capacity of 600,000 tonnes of wood pellets annually by 2019.

“Enviva is very excited to formally welcome the Greenwood team to the Enviva family,” Royal Smith, Enviva’s Executive Vice President of Operations, said in a press release. “Together, we look forward to growing this facility in partnership with the Greenwood community and our sustainable supply chain that includes forest landowners, loggers, truckers and the mechanical and other service providers essential to keeping a world-class manufacturing operation running smoothly.”

Enviva CEO John Keppler said in the same release that this latest investment was meant to ensure Enviva’s ability to meet contracted demand for biomass in Europe and Asia.

The company’s holdings include seven operational manufacturing plants across the south-east of the US, with one under construction. The total capacity of these sites comes to over 4 million tonnes of wood pellets a year.