Turning Waste Into Business: Synthica Breaks Ground In Floyd
When beer goes bad, what do you do with it? One answer: turn it into renewable energy via natural gas.
“What if that beer itself was recycled?” Synthica Energy CEO Sam Schutte asked. “We get the beer out of the cans, turn it into natural gas, and recycle the aluminum.”
Every day, tons of waste go into landfills. Synthica is banking on the idea that waste could be recycled and sold to industrial customers. The Cincinnati-based company will apply an anaerobic digestion process to organic industrial byproducts to produce renewable natural gas.
That natural gas would then be injected into existing pipeline infrastructure and distributed to customers.
An added benefit, Schutte said, is that the metaphorical wasted beer, along with other organic waste products like fry grease, won’t be sitting in landfills.
On Wednesday, the company broke ground on its latest renewable natural gas facility off West Hermitage Road in northern Floyd County, Georgia.
Originally, Synthica proposed a $38.25 million local investment with the potential for 15 jobs paying an average of $43 per hour. However, that investment may now be closer to $68.25 million, with 19 jobs averaging $43 per hour.
When the plant is completed in 2026, the company expects the facility to divert nearly 250,000 tons of waste from local landfills and sewers annually.
The Floyd County location, about halfway between Atlanta and Chattanooga, is zoned for heavy industrial use and has ample gas line access, checking off all the boxes for Synthica.
But it wasn’t just the infrastructure. Synthica wanted to find the right community.
“Wherever we go, we want to make sure we’re a good fit,” said Valerie McDonough, Synthica’s market development lead. “We don’t want to shoehorn ourselves into a place we’re not welcome.”
McDonough credited Rome-Floyd County Development Authority President Missy Kendrick for leading them to the Floyd County location. Kendrick also serves as president of the Gordon-Floyd Joint Development Authority, which oversaw the sale of 10.4 acres to Synthica.
The property sits southeast of Ga. 53, between Calhoun Highway and West Hermitage Road, near the Ball Corporation facility.
“Synthica is our newest and will be one of our greatest corporate citizens,” Kendrick said. “They will help us meet some of our sustainability goals by diverting waste from landfills and turning it into natural gas.”