MOU Executed for Securing the Ontonagon Biorefinery Site

October 22, 2023

SynSel and Lost Bowl Development LLC have executed a MOU to either acquire the 135-acre parcel of land on the shores of Lake Superior or a long-term lease. SynSel will utilize the land for deploying a closed loop biorefinery producing a drop-in renewable transportation fuel. The plant will be run by approximately 100 trained operators from the immediate area. The site formerly hosted the Smurfit Stone paper mill. 

The history of Ontonagon includes the great fire of September 12, 1896. “The fire destroyed nearly all the town’s infrastructure, including its entire business district, bank, courthouse, jail, churches, hotels, schools and most of its residences. Over 100 years later, Ontonagon and the entire county has again been visited by a disaster of near equal proportion, this one arriving more slowly and insidiously than the fire of 1896, but having nearly the same effect. Economic collapse has resulted in the closure of the White Pine Copper mine in 1995, which at one time employed nearly 2,000 employees from the region. Another shipyard/manufacturing facility employed nearly 150 closed. In late 2010 the White Pine refinery closed. And the closure of the Smurfit Stone paper mill in 2010, employing approximately 280, means that all of Ontonagon’s industrial manufacturing facilities are closed. The mill and the vast majority of its’ infrastructure were demolished in 2011.” States Pat Tucker, principal Lost Bowl Development and longtime resident of Ontonagon. 

The biorefinery represents an epic restoration to Ontonagon County of Michigan that has shown a 14.2% population decline between 2010 and 2020. Michigan ranks 49th of US States in population growth – West Virginia is the only state trailing. 

Always sparsely populated, the Upper Peninsula has suffered the sharpest decline in the state in recent decades. Industries that power the economy in the western U.P. — mining and lumber — have dwindled or disappeared. Source Michigan Bridge https://www.bridgemi.com/business-watch/western-upper-peninsula-towns-empty-out-look-wisconsin-lessons 

The site is strategic, not only for the economic restoration of the most stressed region in the State of Michigan but also for its proximity to Michigan Technological University (MTU) in Houghton Michigan. MTU is also located in the Upper Peninsula (UP) of Michigan and is considered one of the best academia gateways for the promotion of biorefinery platforms. MTU performed the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) of SynSel’s chosen drop-in renewable fuel biofuel technology. The LCA determined that the biorefinery will produce fuel with a +90% reduction in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This makes the car parked in your driveway with an internal combustion engine operating on SynSel fuel far “greener” than an Electric Vehicle (EV). 

Initial funds for covering permit and engineering are anticipated to be released in Q1 2024. Permit and engineering will take approximately 1 year with another 3 years of construction to follow.