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CalPlant MDF Manufacturing Plant
Submitting Company: Industrial Projects Consulting
Location: Willows, California
Cost: $400 million
Owner/Developer: CalPlant I
Engineers: Evergreen Engineering (balance of plant engineer/engineer of record), Siempelkamp GmbH (process design)
Additional Engineering Firms: AV Spalding Associates, KH2A Engineering, Smith Monroe Gray Engineers
General Contractor: Industrial Projects Consulting (construction manager – multiple prime contracts)
Subcontractors: Columbia Water Technology, Con-Vey, Harris Group ILB, Industrial Control and Design, Industrial Projects Consulting, North Coast Fabricators, O&M, Pederson Bros., Petrochem, Phoenix Industrial, Rogers Machinery, Schuon Manufacturing, Western Pneumatics, Western States Fire Protection

The CalPlant project is the first medium-density fiberboard (MDF) manufacturing plant in the world utilizing rice straw as the raw material for its product. At full capacity, the operation will produce more than 150 million square feet of MDF annually and use 280,000 tons of rice straw.

The project site is 273 acres, of which 25 acres is used for the plant itself. The balance of the land is used to store the approximately 330,000 tons of baled rice straw that must be harvested in a six-week period each year to feed the plant. CalPlant is staffed by 140 full-time employees with as many as 500 part-time jobs created during the annual straw-collection period.

Six major buildings were erected, totaling about 300,000 square feet. Installation of process equipment from Europe shipped to the site in 800 shipping containers and 250 break-bulk shipments. Crews placed 25,000 cubic yards of concrete; erected 3,000 tons of custom-designed structural steel; and installed 11 miles of process and utility piping.

The project also involved the installation of six types of fire suppression systems. Wiring and raceway for 35 megawatts of electrical power was installed, including a fan motor of 1,050 horsepower and two refiner motors of approximately 5,000 hp each.

Among several challenges, the handling and processing of baled rice straw required specialized equipment not typically found in wood-based MSF. These equipment commissioning challenges increased during startup due to COVID-19 travel restrictions that hindered interaction with European counterparts.

CalPlant also was impacted by historic wildfires that created restrictive low smoke ceilings, at times obscuring the tops of cranes, and caused severe health and safety issues for the construction staff.

The project’s environmental benefits include a reduction in greenhouse gas, as considerably less rice fields will be burned and local air quality will improve.