Moorhead lands $5B sustainable jet fuel plant and its 650 jobs

A $5 billion facility to manufacture jet fuel for airplanes is coming to Moorhead.

DG Fuels, a Washington D.C.-based energy company, announced it’s putting a sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) plant in Clay County, bringing 650 jobs to northwestern Minnesota’s border with North Dakota.

The facility, which expects to start production in 2030, will convert agriculture and timber waste into jet fuel, according to a statement from Greater MSP, a Twin Cities-based regional development organization.

“We not only want to lead the world in de-carbonizing air travel” at Minnesota-St. Paul International Airport, said Greater MSP CEO Peter Frosch. “But we want to produce that SAF in Minnesota.”

The selection of Moorhead, Frosch said, was evidence of the concerted push from the Minnesota SAF Hub — which includes government, universities, nonprofits and companies, including Bank of America and Delta Air Lines — to ramp up production of SAF in Minnesota.

The project is also a win for Moorhead.

“With the largest shovel-ready industrial site in the state of Minnesota, we are excited and prepared to compete on the national stage for this economic development opportunity,” said Moorhead Mayor Shelly Carlson in a statement.

While SAF can be produced from biomass streams, including corn stover, industry experts look to perennial crops as well, such as camelina and other oilseeds, as possible sources for feedstocks.

“We have a diverse array of feedstocks [in Minnesota],” said Andrea Vaubel, deputy commissioner at the Minnesota Department of Agriculture. “We’re thrilled for the farmers in the Red River Valley.”

DG Fuels did not respond to a request for an interview. But the facility will produce 193 million gallons of SAF per year and take four years to construct, according to a release from the company. The company says it expects the investment will produce $50 billion in economic activity for the state over the next three decades.

Industry officials say Minnesota has worked to position itself as a SAF-friendly state. In 2023, Gov. Tim Walz and the Legislature passed a tax credit awarding a company $1.50 for every gallon of SAF produced.

In 2023, the U.S. produced fewer than 25 million gallons of SAF. But production of the sustainable fuel is expected to ramp up. A number of airlines, including Delta, have publicly committed to dropping their carbon footprint. Researchers estimate air travel contributes just below 3% annually to global greenhouse gases.

DG Fuels in April announced it is building a 180 million-gallon-a-year plant in Louisiana. That facility will convert waste from sugar cane to SAF.

In September, the first SAF-powered commercial jet to fly from MSP completed a flight to LaGuardia Airport in New York.