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By the looks of things, the industry is about to explode. Currently, there’s only one operating plant in the whole of California located in Coachella Valley, although there are reports of as many as three to five new biodiesel plants. Meanwhile, out in Galveston, Texas, Chevron is building a 100 million gallon plant.

“People ask me, ‘Well how can you compete with a 100 million gallon plant?’” Gillis says. “The fact is that America uses 40 billion gallons of diesel every year. California alone uses 4.4 billion. There’s a huge demand.”

But Gillis says his company has no plans to build massive plants like Chevron’s in Galveston. Instead their business plan is “community oriented.”

“We want to create a closed loop in the community,” Gillis says. “Eventually we want to work with the renderers to collect all the yellow grease from local restaurants. Then we’re going to buy that processed oil and sell it back to the community it came from.”

Currently, the availability of oil-based crops and yellow grease is not sufficient in quantity to meet the demands for biodisel. Experts agree it will take many years for biodiesel fuel production to seriously penetrate and acquire increased market share. As a result, Gilles is putting out the word to farmers interested in experimenting with oil-based crops.

Interested farmers are encouraged to contact Alternative Solutions at 359-4499 or visit bioeasi.com.