Construction has begun on a 37-acre feed production plant in Memphis, Tennessee, which will house the world’s largest gas fermentation operation.
The operation will produce Calysta’s FeedKind protein, a feed ingredient for fish, livestock and pets, created by NouriTech and backed by investor companies, Calysta and Cargill.
“FeedKind protein is a new sustainable feed ingredient that is critical to helping meet sharply rising global demand for food,” said Alan Shaw, president and CEO of Calysta. “We are delighted to partner with Cargill and the Memphis community to launch construction at NouriTech of our first commercial scale manufacturing plant. This is the next step in bringing this important product to markets throughout the world.”
The first phase of construction is expected to be completed in 2018, with the plant online in 2019, and the second phase of construction completed in 2020.
The site will include twenty fermenters and several dryers alongside various processing, filtration and product handling and loading equipment.
Two fermenters are expected to be installed in the first phase of construction and up to an additional 18 in the second phase, while one dryer will be built and used for the first phase of construction and the remaining dryers built in phase two.
Located on Cargill’s 69-acre property on President’s Island, the plant is expected to generate approximately 160 full-time jobs and produce 200m kg of FeedKind annually.
“Today's groundbreaking is an important milestone for this project and our Cargill Memphis campus as it demonstrates our ongoing commitment to Tennessee, Shelby County and Memphis and has expanded our pledge to aquaculture as an increasingly important source of food,” said managing director of Cargill, Mike Wagner.
