The plant closed after a fire stemming from a failed heat exchanger on March 29. Evergreen on Nov. 9 announced it put the rerefinery back in operation Oct. 18. The site has 80 employees.

The API Group II rerefinery has two trains, according to Evergreen Oil spokesman Mark Williams. The newest train is up and running, and the old train is down so were at about 50 percent capacity, which is about 800 barrels per day capacity, Williams told Lube Report. Buyers have already been lined up for the production output, he confirmed.

The old train is expected to be back in operation sometime early next year, Williams said, although no specific startup date has been set. When both trains are up and running, Williams said the rerefined Group II capacity is expected to reach nearly 1,600 b/d.

We have worked very closely with all the state and local agencies to ensure that we met all their requirements before restarting the plant, said Robert Gwaltney, vice president of operations. And we have implemented new safety procedures and updated our operating procedures to make certain our plant is operated at the highest safety standards.

Gwaltney said Evergreen is doing more to keep the local community informed, including notifying them about the restart and instituting a new 24 hours a day/seven days a week hotline specifically for questions about odor coming from the plant.

We reached out to the community to try to assure them we were doing everything we can to ensure that the operation ran safely, Williams added. We found that wasnt really an issue with them – it was more the odors coming from the plant. So now were working closely with the community and doing everything we can to minimize the odors, and make sure we address the needs of the community.