Locals fighting ethanol plants

Two proposed ethanol plants in separate states are being opposed by local residents - and one group seems to have won its fight.

A company that proposed a nearly $200 million coal-burning ethanol plant in Des Moines, Iowa has pulled its offer, leaving the City Council on Monday with only a natural gas-powered facility to consider.

Officials from Lincolnway Energy, a Nevada, Iowa, firm, did not provide city officials with a reason for withdrawing its proposal. The contract will now apparently go to Vision Fuels of Urbandale, Iowa.

"So we won? Wow," said Scott Rich, a Des Moines resident who launched a petition last month opposing the coal-burning plant. "I figured for that kind of money, it would be a tooth-and-nail fight."

And in Dodge City, Kansas, foes of a proposed ethanol plant are mulling a lawsuit to stall the plans if county commissioners grant developers permission to move forward.

A group of area farmers and other investors hope to build a 110-million-gallon per year ethanol plant, Boot Hill Biofuels, near the unincorporated town of Wright. Some area residents oppose the plans, however, and filed a protest petition this week with the Ford County Clerk's office that would require a unanimous vote from county commissioners to approve the requisite conditional use permit. Commissioners are to consider the matter on Dec. 18.

Critics worry about truck traffic the new plant would generate and the water it would draw from the underground aquifer, among other things. They unsuccessfully lobbied the Ford County Zoning Board on Monday, which ended up recommending that commissioners approve the ethanol plant plans.

Developers tout the jobs the plant will create and the economic lift it will bring to area farmers and others.