Poet To Become World's Largest Ethanol Producer

By Ben Shouse
bshouse@argusleader.com
Published: June 17, 2007

Sioux Falls-based Poet is poised to become the world’s largest ethanol producer, overtaking agribusiness giant Archer Daniels Midland.

Poet has a different ownership model from some of its competitors. Both ADM and Brookings-based Verasun are publicly traded, whereas Poet is a private company with thousands local investors in its plants.

But when its 21st plant opens in Indiana this September, Poet’s hand will be on the spigot of more than 1.1 billion gallons of annual production capacity, according to the company’s figures. That will eclipse ADM’s 1.07 billion gallons of capacity, which will not increase until at least 2008, ADM has said.

The milestone is a sign of longstanding trends in the industry. And it could portend even more significant transformation, as Poet pushes to make commercial fuel from materials other than corn starch.

“We began as a one-million-gallon pure producer back in 1988, and we have just been on a continuous path of steady growth in this industry,” said Jeff Broin, Poet president and CEO.

http://www.argusleader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070617/NEWS/70617002/1001