A company that produces “green energy” is breathing new life into the economy-weakened hopes for the Lakewood Industrial Park.
Organic Diversion LLC of Marlton, a business that collects food waste and recycles it into low-cost fuel, is looking to build a plant here, said Mayor Menashe P. Miller.
Miller said he was skeptical at first about how Organic Diversion could make a profit and pay taxes. Most important, would it smell? Rotting food waste emitting methane gas to produce energy also concerned him, the mayor said.
“These were all questions I had for myself when this was proposed,” Miller said.
So he wanted to see — and smell — the recycling plants for himself.
Miller and two other township officials, economic development Executive Director Steven Reinman and Tax Assessor Ed Seeger Jr., traveled to Germany in early April — at the expense of Organic Diversion — to see three of the company’s plants near and in Allendorf and Berlin.
When Organic Diversion, the New Jersey division based in Marlton, proposed to build a green energy plant in the Lakewood Industrial Park, said Reinman, director of economic development for Lakewood, it was a perfect match. It is the kind of business that the township is hoping to attract.
Lakewood benefits by having a business that will pay taxes and use very little municipal resources. Organic Diversion also plans to sell electricity produced at reduced cost to the township’s Municipal Utilities Authority as well as the Public Works Department.
So a large German company wants to open a factory in a highly populated Jewish area with presumably proportional use of Jewish labor, with the said goal of recycling unproductive refuse with non-foul smelling gas into a profitable business that will also improve the environment. Where did I hear this before?
Can it also be a museum?
I hope it's accessible by train.
I know a company in Iran that manufactures timer devices that wants to open a Lakewood factory.
I have a list of prospective employees.
Are they selling naming rights?
These are the best comments ever
Organ Diversion. Great name.
Not to nitpick, but was this company recruited by the township or was the township approached by the company?
To negotiate a deal like this is still hard work and the officials are well deserving of credit. I hope that the township is even more PROACTIVE in these trying times to bring more jobs and business to Lakewood.
Lucky guys! To go on an all expenses paid junket to beautiful German cities like Allendorf and Berlin--- it doesn't get any better than that. I'm sure Major Miller was getting homesick for Iraq.
I don't care if they're from Germany, as long as they're an honest company that does good work and helps the local economy. Like they say, "work makes one free".
I cannot believe the racist comments posted about this German company.
I concur. It's disgusting how "you people" hold a grudge for so long. It's almost 70 years ago.
And it was only six million people. Nobody's perfect.
Do they recycle potato peels?
How about glass?
German companies are successful because of their engineering prowess, their work ethic, a constant striving for quality improvement and excellence, and an abhorrence of mediocrity. They could teach our township government a thing or two.
They talk bad about the German company but watch who gets the good paying jobs.
Arthur Godfrey deserves the credit for this.
Is the Bergen plant from the same company?