By Brian Ojanpa, Mankato Free Press

LE SUEUR — The fate of a controversial biofuel plant project for Le Sueur could be headed for a public vote.

Petitions containing hundreds of signatures of those opposed to the project have been presented to the City Council, the start of a multiple-step process to secure a referendum on the $30 million plant.

The plan was first introduced in 2009. The plant would be unique to Minnesota in that it would convert a variety of food-processing and animal wastes into energy.

But the devil has been in the details, and proponents and opponents have drawn lines in the sand regarding the proposed site — actually an abandoned sand pit.

City Council Member John Schultz, among others, calls the project “dysfunctional” and deserving of demise.

But proponents, such as Mayor Bob Oberle, remain steadfast in their support of it.

“From my aspect, I have to view the potential of this project, not its (perceived) nuisances,” Oberle said. “Those petitions have a lot of signatures, but they have unsubstantiated exaggerations … they’re ginning up a lot of fears.”

The plant proposal is under the auspices of Minnesota Municipal Power Agency, which includes Le Sueur and 10 other member cities, and Avant Energy of Minneapolis, which develops power plant projects for municipal entities.

The plant would convert chicken manure, potato-processing residues and corn silage into energy through a process called anaerobic digestion, a technology that converts wastes into methane, which is then burned to produce electricity.

The process is common in Europe, but much less so in the United States.

Le Sueur City Administrator Rick Almich has said the project is being pursued as the city looks to increase the reliability of its energy by reducing transmission costs.

The plant would be designed to provide 40 percent of Le Sueur’s power needs with electricity going directly to the city’s power grid.

The project also is being driven by a state mandate calling for the state to produce 25 percent of its power via alternate means, such as ag waste and wind turbines, by 2025.

Backers of the Le Sueur plant tout the economic benefits it would bring, including well-paying jobs and boosts in area trucking contracts — in peak season about 30 vehicles daily would freight waste to the facility.

Opponents, however, maintain that the project was poorly conceived and is fraught with downsides such as property-value declines for homes near the plant, air-quality issues and the questionable availabilities of the required waste products.

The petitions were presented to the council by Le Sueur resident Ed Michaelson, who declined to comment and referred questions to members of the opponent group Le Sueur Area Concerned Citizens, some of whom have been publicly vocal.

Group member Frank Ebert, a former environmental-standards compliance official for General Mills, has called the project “pathetic” for what he terms a lack of proper planning.

The site on the south end of town is the second to be considered. The original site, in the city’s new Energy Park north of town, was eschewed when it was determined more room was needed to accommodate new plans for a larger plant.

Avant Energy spokesperson Kelsey Dahlen said this is Avant’s and the Minnesota Municipal Power Agency’s first venture into a biofuel production project.

She acknowledged that the proposal hasn’t been an easy sell.

“To be honest, we’ve been taken aback by some of the extreme responses we have gotten.”

She said in her chats with residents, people who are supportive of the project are generally mum about it because they don’t want to get into arguments with their neighbors.

“Some think it’s an exciting project, others have ‘drawn the line,’ and there are people in the middle.”

Oberle said that at the core of people’s opposition to the project rests a territorial mindset known as NIMBY — Not In My Back Yard — and their stated reasons for opposing it smack of fear-mongering.

He said if the state ultimately signs off on the project following the requisite environmental assessments, and if Avant and MMPA follow through with their due diligence, “Then who am I to stand in the way of it?”

Schultz and others say they won’t drink that Kool-Aid.

“This is a unique hell that they (Avant) have brought to our community for years,” he said.

“As I’ve been saying to people, if this project goes belly up, we’re going to have a schadenfreude festival and hang every (Avant and MMPA official) in effigy.”

Schadenfreude is a German term denoting delight in another’s misfortune.

Regarding the referendum-request petition, the City Council can opt to table it temporarily, vote it down, or take no action. Or it could simply vote to cancel the project.

If the process wends its way to a public vote, it could come as early as this spring.

Dahlen said that’s also when plant construction could begin, pending issuance of requisite state and local permits.