Our ribbon cutting was on May 21st. Tropical storm Alberto was hovering off the South Carolina coast and the surf was up. McCayne scored us a beach house and everyone from Piedmont went along.

Paul and I took down the first load of fuel. When we arrived in mid morning temporary power was rigged up but the card swipe was not talking to the dispenser.

We jumped in the ocean, held a small company wide retreat, then headed to Tidal Creek Coop for the ribbon cutting. It was a blast. Over 50 people showed up. Some media, some board members of our Coop, and some new drivers thirsty for fuel.

This location rose from the remnants of Cape Fear Biofuels, a Wilmington Coop that had already built the B100 community. We had sold them fuel in the past. And we did some educational stuff with them. I have long argued that theirs was the best looking logo and short truck in the movement.

Wilmington is outside of our usual “100 mile footprint,” but after persistent pressure from former Cape Fear enthusiasts, we decided to bite the bullet and open in Wilmington. We can thank our 2011 board of directors for pushing us over the edge on this one.

By the time we arrived for the ribbon cutting the dispenser was working beautifully and we were able to pump fuel.

One of the cool things about this ribbon cutting was that we were constantly “interrupted” by people wanting fuel. Kevin pulled in from Go Eco Disposal with an eye popping garbage truck—delighted to be able to move his fleet back to B100. Aaron pulled in with a cherry Mercedes that he had bought at auction from the Abundance Foundation years ago. He had a surfboard lashed to the roof rack.

Most people were simply topping up fuel tanks—but we put 124 gallons into the world on the spot—in between the speakers and such. Larry’s Beans was there. They awarded a framed photograph to the Tidal Creek folks—one tank welcoming the next tank into the world. Tidal Creek sells Larry’s Beans coffee and they were there all day providing samples of a new iced summer brew.

Lacey came down from Triangle Clean Cities. They helped fund the project with DOE money from their Blue Skies initiative. Craig Harris from Tidal Creek emceed the event, mentioning that 2012 is the United Nations year of the Coop. One of the principles of cooperative businesses is that coops help other coops—and I have to say Tidal Creek has been exemplary in living up to that ideal. Bill Ladd also spoke. He’s a former Cape Fear board member who did the electricity for this project.

Christopher Yermal from Old School Re-Builders spent some time describing the many recycled products that went into the building’s construction. The building is a masterpiece—now awaiting its new green roof.

Of our six previous locations on the B100 Community Trail, three of them are inside sheds, and those three are far and away our highest performing from a maintenance standpoint. North Carolina winters are perfectly suited to passive solar heating. Give us a little glazing on the south side of the building, and our fuel stays happy even in the dead of winter.

We already have new Wilmington members telling us that since Wilmington is warmer than the Piedmont there should be no need for petroleum adulteration next winter.

After the ribbon cutting we headed up the street to the arboretum for our annual membership meeting. Brian Gullette, our board chair presented our 2011 Annual Report, including our latest Lifecycle Analysis, and we elected a new round of directors—picking up two new board members in Wilmington.

My favorite takeaway from the annual meeting was a member talking about how each month he and his wife review their credit card statements, and how “Piedmont is our favorite bill of the month.”

I should note that it is a Piedmont Biofuels tradition to hold our annual meeting in those cities where we have newly opened dispensers. When we opened in Durham we held our annual meeting at Duke University, inside a Peak Oil conference. When we opened in Raleigh we held our meeting at the MacKimmon Center of NC State courtesy of the NC Solar Center. It feels good to keep that tradition alive—especially when it entails crashing surf.

After the annual meeting we retreated to our beach house to discuss company stuff into the night. The next morning we awoke, jumped in the ocean, topped off the Tidal Creek Tank, and headed for home….

Now there are seven Piedmont operated locations of the B100 Community Trail. If you are headed to the beach this summer, don’t forget your Piedmont membership card, and once you have a full tank, you can get all of your groceries at Tidal Creek Cooperative.

About twenty people showed up, including everyone from Piedmont Biofuels.

Board chair Brian Gullette shared our 2011 Annual Report, and there was a general free wheeling discussion about B100′s return to Wilmington.

Also discussed was the newly published LCA that was performed on our 2011 gallons. We are grateful to the folks at Triangle Lifecycle Assessment for this fine piece of work.

Carol Hewitt, Stephan Caldwell, and Brian Gullette agreed to serve for another one year term. Long time member John Hollingsworth was elected in abstentia. Lyle Estill agreed to represent Piedmont on the board. Lorrie Hinsdale and Kevin Cook, both of the Wilmington area, were also elected.

It looks like we will be needing sunscreen and beach towels for the board meetings which lie ahead…

Experienced and new board members chat with Piedmont staff at the Wilmington annual meeting

For the past couple of years I have spent many nights at the home of Bob and Camille—often commiserating over Piedmont’s financial losses. Their home at Oilseed Community, which they dubbed “Camelina,” was a touchstone for many of us. And when they moved into “Yellow,” and re-christened it “Troutsfarm” they became an anchor for our bend in the Moncure road.

Now that Piedmont is making a profit, I no longer have to sing the blues when I visit their abode. But then again, they are leaving. They are off to Ghana on a wild biodiesel inspired adventure in which they might turn human fecal sludge into fuel.

Their impending departure is a gigantic loss for me. It leaves me jilted and bitter. In my small minded moments I hope they are presented with a short chain feedstock that will never convert into a long chain fuel. But I am just jealous.

I should be happy. Piedmont turned a profit for 2011, and again in the first quarter of 2012. Who would look down their nose at 5 profitable quarters in a row?

But Matt is leaving. He’s off to Asheville where all the cool people live. Dana moved there first—and off he goes. Anna just moved to Asheville. The venison she served at her send off party was exquisite.

Leif’s leaving. Next month he is officially leaving the employ of Piedmont Biofuels and joining the staff of the Biofuels Center of North Carolina. That makes sense. What makes Piedmont profitable is the heavy, hot, nasty, smelly work of moving liquids around. And Leif has done more than his share of that. On one level the work is deeply gratifying. But who wouldn’t trade it for a higher paying desk job in the “policy layer?”

It could be I am jealous of him too. I work at Piedmont, and Piedmont is starting to make a regular profit for the first time in its life. That’s a wonderful time of life. We can share profits and increase wages and invest in pieces and parts. Really, it is all we have ever worked for.

But we are surrounded by losses. Nick Meyer died the other day. He came on a Piedmont tour and offered to give us all of his money because he was dying. We politely declined and edged him over toward the Abundance Foundation. He was a weird fellow.

Abundance and Piedmont cleared space for him, and we wrapped our arms around him, and he contributed work and time and money to everything from the PLENTY to local food Friday to our nascent tilapia project. He was generous, and kind, and often off topic. I liked Nick. And I thought Tami did a wonderful write up about him.

I never had a chance to discuss profits with Nick. He was drawn to us in the losing years.
At my last conversation with him he was looking for work. I hired him to supervise the construction of a “nature interpretive trail” around our campus. Instead of showing up for work, he died.

Earlier this year we lost Oilseed Community. That was a housing project that we brought to fruition. At the time we thought that we needed the money to stay alive, but now that we have started generating profits, no one even misses the revenues that once came from rents. We thought Oilseed would live on as a community asset without us, but it has recently imploded and become something very different from what we are all about.

This should be a celebratory time for us. It turns out that community scale biodiesel really can work. It can be environmentally, and economically sustainable. We are proving it. We just published the best LCA2011of our fuel ever. This ought to be a good time to be at Piedmont.

With apologies to the gospel writer, Mark, I sometimes wonder “What should it profit a man to gain the whole world, but lose Bob and Camille, and Matt and Dana, and Anna, and Leif, and Nick, and Oilseed all at the same time?”

No telling. We could say that all is not lost. And we could also say that everyone we are losing is cheering mightily for our newfound profits.

I suppose there is a chance that everyone but Nick might come back some day. And even Nick will visit our dreams and thoughts.

In the mean time I suppose it is best for us to just keep doing our thing. The fact that we are now a profitable endeavor is something we should shout from the rooftops. It could be the losses are behind us…

He’s also a fan of Elaine’s on Franklin.

The other night we were driving to Chapel Hill and he complained that he had never had “any decent Italian food.” In his opinion pizza was “Americanized” and “all Italian places are chain roadhouses with nothing interesting on the menu.”

Clearly, at age thirteen, Arlo was suffering from “Italian deficit disorder.” I busted a left onto Franklin St. and in no time we were parked at Vespa. I figured that would be the remedy.

And it worked. He experienced some authentic chicken parmigiania, had a taste of anti pasta, sampled some roasted red pepper sauce and asparagus (which is in season here right now).

We had an extraordinary meal, and when it was over, Tami dropped off a “Compliments to the Chef” card. That’s the card many of our members carry around and slip in with their checks. It says, “I came here today on fuel from your used cooking oil. Thank you.”

The waiter took it back to the kitchen with our check, and apparently someone noticed because they sent our a free serving of tiramisu.

I couldn’t help but think that something was working. Our biodiesel drivers are also eaters. And we are successfully linking eaters to dining establishments which provide feedstocks for our fuel.

And each day ends in defeat. I claim what minor victories I can. Things like, “The plumbing works.” Or “I can get power to the pump.” Or “I now have the card swipe talking to the dispenser.”

Long time member Seth Elliott and his daughter Ava stopped by for some B100.

One of the perks of this miserable task is that I get to apologize live to the members who come to fill up. Seth Elliott has been a baker around Carrboro for a long time, and was one of the first members of our Coop.

He bought a mobile pizza oven which he pulls around to parties. His business is called Stone’s Throw Pizza, and it sounds like a no brainer for anyone wishing to throw a pizza party. Simply hire Seth to do the work.

As I make baby steps, the whole site goes up a notch. The external filter has been removed so that the “hose dance” is no longer required of our members. The dispenser which arrived “fire engine red” is now Piedmont Green. The bollards have a fresh coat of paint. Little things, mostly done while waiting for telephone technical support from the dispenser company, who tells me the problem lies with the card swipe vendor. Or from the electrician who blames the plumber. Or from the card swipe company that blames the electrician.

It’s maddening. But here is where we stand. You can swipe your card and the pump will turn on, and you can dispense fuel for a brief time. How much goes into your tank is based on how fast you are. You might get 7.5 gallons. You might get 4.2 gallons. We can see these gallons, and we can charge your card, but in order to fill your tank you need to swipe over and over again.

It’s completely lame.

It has to be something in the wiring. We are successfully reading cards, and telling the pump to turn on, but once fuel is being dispensed, we don’t seem to be returning a signal which says, “don’t shut off until I’m done.”

So we are still working on it. Sorry. The Carrboro location does get better every day….

We’ve done these events for years, and they have ebbed and flowed. Last night was big. I think Katy gets a point for organizing it. We went to Glass Half Full, and to Milltown, two accounts in Carrboro from which we collect their used cooking oil. Two accounts that we are grateful to have.

Brian was there. He is the president of our Coop board. Carol was there. She is also on the board. Nick was there. He’s a former intern, and he was complaining about the lack of action on Energy Blog. It was a large turnout last night.

I had a hundred wonderful conversations ranging from new debt raising methods to equity investments to mobile phone applications to basic gratitude for the creation of our fuel.

There is an inescapable aspect to this business, in that people are grateful for what we do. People like to be free from the petroleum grid. And people like to be able to have a beer with Link, and Ray, and the people who make their fuel possible.

Tami and I experienced this first hand a week ago when we drove our fuel delivery truck in the Saint Patrick’s Day Parade in Raleigh. Twenty thousand people lined the streets and we were perpetually greeted with rounds of applause, folks giving us the “thumbs up,” and shouting from the crowd that we were “truly green.” It was edifying.

We haven’t been able to figure out how to pay people with fame or edification—but it feels good just the same. A lot of people care deeply about what we do.

Last night I came home to a warm house and a dying fire. And I had Nick’s comments lodged in my brain.

This morning Link loaded up a brand new dispenser which I delivered to our Carrboro Public Works location. We tore out the dead unit and plumbed in a beautiful new unit. Tomorrow I move on electrical to make it live.

It’s been down for over a month. Part of that was our fault. Instead of jumping on it with a professional repair crew we languished around in our own little “do it yourself” state of mind. It turns out we are not real good at repairing a 17 year old dispenser that has been eaten alive by B100 and has been out of production for a decade.

I’ve thought a lot about this. If we were BP we would have a “hot swap” in stock. And I have also thought about how it is not unusual for a dispenser to “go down.” When that happens at a gas station, you have another 4 pumps to choose from.

But we don’t have that. We have one pump. With no backup. And when we order a replacement unit we need to put 50% of the cash down in order to take delivery.

I worked on Carrboro plumbing until noon, then ran off to North Hills Mall to discuss a new dispensing location. These days I wear dry cleaned shirts instead of my oil soaked uniform. Instead of turning valves and helping out “production,” I spend my time with banks, and with shopping mall administrators, and with granting agencies. Today was a difficult wardrobe day.

Sometimes I’m on the end of a wrench, or shoveling fish fat, sometimes I am dressed up and playing “President.”

My new job is to build new locations of the B100 Community Trail fast.

All of which is merely a lame apology to Nick for not updating the world here. We’re slammed. We are going ninety miles per hour. We are looking forward to restoring Carrboro to its former glory, and to the next Grease appreciation night.

3- 07-2012 Piedmont Biofuels is named on  the first ‘Best for the World’ companies list.

B Lab released the first ‘Best for the World’ lists recognizing companies creating the most positive overall social and environmental impact. The ‘Best for the World’ companies score 50% higher than nearly 2,000 other sustainable businesses, and in the top 10% among more than 500 Certified B Corporations, in the most comprehensive and independent assessment of overall corporate impact.  B Lab also released separate lists of the ‘Best for the Environment’, ‘Best for the Community’, and ‘Best for Workers’.

“These companies are leading a global movement to redefine success in business,” said Jay Coen Gilbert, co founder of B Lab, the nonprofit organization that certifies B Corporations and governs the independent third party standard used to generate the comparable assessment of corporate impact.  “These companies are the best in the world at being the best for the world,” Coen Gilbert added.

The ‘Best for the World’ lists are featured in the just released 2012 B Corp Annual Report.  Businesses recognized for their extraordinary performance include:

- For Overall Impact: Better World Books, Global Green Energy Corp, Green Building Services, Larry’s Beans, Method Home Products, Moving Forward Education, Namaste Solar, New Resource Bank, Next Street, Partnership Capital Growth, Piedmont Biofuels, PREM Group, Re:Vision Architecture, RecycleBank, South Mountain Company, Southern Energy Management, SQA Pharmacy Services, The Redwoods Group, and Virginia Community Capital.

- For the Environment: Brightworks, Bullfrog Power, Ecovations, gDiapers, Global Green Energy Corp., GoLite, Green Building Services, Guayaki Sustainable Rainforest Products, IceStone, Larry’s Beans, Method Products, Namaste Solar, New Leaf Paper, Patagonia, Piedmont Biofuels, Preserve, Re:Vision Architecture, Salt Spring Coffee, Southern Energy Management, and Sustainable Solutions Unlimited.

- For the Community: Agora Management Corporation, Cap Global, Care2.com, Change.org, Ecovations, FMYI, Hershey Cause, Ideal Network, Mal Warwick Associates, Moving Forward Education, New Resource Bank, Next Street, PeaceWorks Technology Solutions, Prem Group, SQA Pharmacy Services, thedatabank, The Redwoods Group, and Virginia Community Capital.

- For Workers: Change.org, Exponent Partners, First Affirmative Financial Network, First Rate, Inc., Heller Consulting, King Arthur Flour Company, Namaste Solar, Partnership Capital Growth, PeaceWorks Technology Solutions, Rally Software, Re:Vision Architecture, Relevance, South Mountain Company, Sungevity, The Caprock Group, and thedatabank, inc.

Six companies were recognized as ‘Best for the World’ in multiple impact areas: Namaste Solar (Environment and Workers); Re:Vision Architecture (Environment and Workers); Change.org (Community and Workers); PeaceWorks Technology Solutions (Community and Workers); thedatabank (Community and Workers); and Ecovations (Environment and Community).

B Lab is a nonprofit organization dedicated to using the power of business to solve social and environmental problems.  B Lab drives systemic change through three interrelated initiatives: 1) building a community of Certified B Corporations to make it easier for all of us to tell the difference between “good companies” and just good marketing; 2) accelerating the growth of the impact investing asset class through use of B Lab’s GIIRS impact rating system by institutional investors; and 3) promoting legislation creating a new corporate form that meets higher standards of purpose, accountability and transparency.  To earn certification, B Corporations must achieve a minimum score on the B Impact Assessment, which measures a company’s impact on its workforce, suppliers, consumers, community, and the environment, and are legally required to consider the interests of these stakeholders, not just shareholders, when making decisions. Learn more at bcorporation.net, benefitcorp.net, and giirs.org.