As New Heaven Chemicals Iowa LLC, a division of TSS Group India, nears completion of its new 18,000-ton sodium methylate manufacturing plant at the Manly Terminal in Manly, Iowa, the company is well underway in developing another biodiesel catalyst facility in Texas.

“We are in the permitting stage for our second plant, which will be in the Houston area,” Prasad Devineni, managing director for New Heaven Chemicals, told Biodiesel Magazine. “The Houston plant will have similar capacity to, if not more than, the Iowa plant.”

Devineni said the company plans to start construction on the Houston-area plant as soon the Iowa facility is completed, which is expected in February. Equipment for the Houston operation is already under fabrication.

“It is our goal to serve the two biggest biodiesel-producing markets with local catalyst manufacturing operations,” Devineni said.

The company also has plans for a Phase II build-out in Iowa that will expand sodium methylate production from 18,000 tons to 24,000 tons. The capital investment for Phase I is $15 million, with an additional $5 million to complete Phase II.

TSS Group is also the parent company of SMOTEC Plus, another sodium methylate manufacturing company that has been supplying biodiesel catalysts to the U.S. from its production site in Dammam, Saudi Arabia, for several years.