North Dakota’s “Red Trail Energy” ethanol plant becomes the first to join voluntary carbon market

While several flyover states work to decide on how to handle carbon pipelines, a project in North Dakota is taking on carbon storage themselves.

Red Trail Energy is a 64 million-gallon-per-year ethanol plant in the Western part of the state. They have joined a voluntary carbon market, and say they are the first ethanol plant in the world to do it. They store carbon on-site, in a well 6,500 feet below the facility.

Since 2022, they have taken in nearly 250,000 tons of CO2. One ton can generate one credit, and those can be bought by companies looking to offset their carbon emissions.

The CEO of Eco-Engineers says he hopes more ethanol plants will follow suit.