“Cool Planet chose Louisiana for multiple reasons, including abundant renewable feedstock supply and a business-friendly attitude toward innovative companies like ours,” Cool Planet Energy Systems CEO Howard Janzen says. “The support we have seen here enhances our unique distributed production model, which envisions locating small bio-refineries near biomass sources to keep both operating and capital costs low. Our goal is to have operating and capital costs that are competitive with conventional oil industry gasoline production costs.”

According to an article in Industry Week, Cool Planet relies on micro-refineries to convert nonfood biomass into high-octane gasoline, diesel fuel and jet fuel. The process is known as a carbon-negative process, ultimately leading to a net reduction of greenhouse gases.

To that end, the company will use wood waste and other forest byproducts to make gasoline at its Louisiana facilities, with each refinery capable of producting 10 million gallons of gasoline. The Industry Week article also notes that the fuel can be used for today's road vehicles.

The article also notes that Cool Planet will market biochar, a byproduct of the refining process that will be used as an agricultural supplement to boost water retention and reduce carbon released from crops.

The Industry Week article also points out that Cool Planet production plants are 100 times smaller than a typical oil refinery. Because they are mainly prefabricated plants, they can be moved near concentrated biomass sources, such as wood (in the case of Louisiana). This ends up reducing transportation costs, meaning the gasoline from these plants is competitive with prices offered by the oil refineries. Cool Planet's business model involves development of 400 such micro-refineries across the United States within the next decade.