TPW begins unit train service to Pacific Ethanol facility

Written by Kyra Senese, Managing Editor
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GWI

Pacific Ethanol, Inc. (PEIX) and Toledo, Peoria & Western Railway (TPW), a subsidiary of Genesee & Wyoming, Inc. (GWI), began unit train service Nov. 14 from PEIX’s Pekin, Ill., plant.  

 

“This unit-train solution enables us to increase our overall sales volumes by expanding our ethanol distribution to new markets on the East Coast,” said Pacific Ethanol CEO Neil Koehler. “This agreement with TPW builds on our producer-marketer business plan for the Pekin plant, increasing revenue and providing reliable and efficient service to customers in new markets.”

With the start of the new service, the Tazewell & Peoria Railroad, a GWI-owned switching and terminal railroad that serves the Pekin plant, hauls the plant’s daily output to Creve Coeur, Ill., where the connecting TPW track capacity allows for aggregating the railcars and assembling as many as 96 unit train cars.

Representatives say the TPW, a 200-mile shortline, will then interchange the unit trains with connecting Class 1 railroads to deliver to their final destinations, which are said to be east of the Mississippi River.

“Enabling Pacific Ethanol to originate unit trains on the TPW is the third recent example of [GWI’s] commitment to the biofuels industry,” said Mike Webb, senior vice president for distribution services for Genesee & Wyoming Railroad Services, Inc. “This past July, we announced a project that allows an ethanol customer to receive unit trains via [GWI’s] Arkansas Midland Railroad, and last year at this time, our San Diego & Imperial Valley Railroad opened a Choice Terminal bulk transload facility with a biofuels company as its anchor customer.”

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