American Commodity Company

THE CUSTOMER

American Commodity Company, LLC (ACC) is a full-service handler and marketer of California milled and paddy rice.

Since its inception in 2000, American Commodity Company has grown from a rough rice marketing pool to a fully integrated rice company.

ACC owns multiple drying and storage facilities that are strategically located throughout the California rice-growing region. In addition, ACC owns and operates a state of the art rice milling facility in Williams, California.  From this central location, the Company delivers the very highest quality finished rice  products to discerning customers throughout the US and around the world.

THE NEED

Rice hulls are a natural by-product of ACC’s milling process and can be subject to significant disposal costs.  As part of the current sustainability efforts in California, the California Public Utilities Commission operates a BioMat Program that incentivizes biomass projects up to 5 MW.  ACC has long been recognized as a sustainability leader within the U.S.A. rice industry and became the first rice company to participate in the California Biomat Program.  ACC operates a 4MW system that currently supplies electricity to one of the major public utilities within California.

OUR SOLUTION

To meet our customer needs, Turboden uses the production waste - rice husk - as fuel to be burned in the combustion chamber. The combustion of this biomass generates heat that is exchanged within a closed thermal oil circuit which is then transferred to our Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) system. The ORC system then generates electricity which can ultimately be supplied to the local power grid.

Thanks to solutions like this, Turboden can add value to an operation by efficiently transforming costly biomass waste materials into useful green power.