FORKS — This job-starved city is being eyed for a project that could transform the shuttered Interfor planer mill into a high-end brewery-bottling plant.
Forks is one of the top two of four cities in Washington state being considered for the brewery, which eventually would employ more than 120, said Charlie Rau, chief technology officer for Spokane-based Eco Frack Inc.
If the business locates in Forks, the beer’s moniker would be Rain Forest Brew or Rainforest Brew, Rau, who lives in Gig Harbor, said Thursday.
Rau, a water quality specialist, said that as a marketing ploy, the name would link the libation to the West End’s most iconic and nationally known natural attraction — the rain forest.
The brewing company would be called ECO cubed.
“We are fascinated by the fact that it is a rain forest,” said Rau, a frequent visitor to Forks and a U.S. patent-holder in water reclamation technologies.
“We have to bring water to uber purity to make this work.”
Eco Frack is a water mediation company involved in the fracking business, which uses high-pressure water to extract oil and natural gas from shale.
Rau has developed systems for reclaiming water used in fracking.
He said he and other business associates, some from Eco Frack, are forming the brewing company, which plans to use water from the aquifer that feeds the city water system for the specialty beers.
Rau, also chief technology office for ECO cubed, expects the company to make a siting decision by mid-January.
He and other company backers have a business plan and more than $4 million in committed financing to go toward the project, though they will need “easily” twice that amount to get it up and running the first beer is poured.
The Clallam County West End city best know for fishing and the home of the Twilight novel and movie series is in a strong position, Rau said.
“Forks is getting a better position because of the efforts of marketing,” he said, referring to the rain forest link.
“Our marketing analyst thought that was a pretty damn good idea.”
The city obtains its water from an underground aquifer.
“We have enough to supply their needs,” Rod Fleck, city attorney and planner, said Wednesday.
He and other economic development and government officials familiar with the brewery proposal took a wait-and-see attitude.
“To me, it’s very preliminary,” Fleck said.
“They’ve got a really good idea, and they are looking at ways to develop that idea into a marketable product.”
The brewery, which could be located in the city-owned Interfor building at the city-owned industrial park, would be complemented by a beer garden either at the former mill at 143 Sitkum-Sol Duc Road or closer to the center of town, Rau said.
Rau said he recently visited Forks to look at potential sites.
In June, Interfor shut down its Forks planer mill and Beaver saw mill, eliminating 87 family-wage positions.
Rau said the Forks site stood out during his visit, but that if it didn’t work out, the brewing company might build anew to accommodate its plans.
“It does have the kind of building that would be suitable for a bottling plant and stacking the bottles in cases,” Rau said.
“It would appear it has most of the things that we would require.”
The facility would be developed by building modular brewing units offsite and installing them as demand for the beer dictates.
In the same vein, the company would employ between one and two dozen workers at first and could expand to “way over 120 people there at some point,” Rau said.
“This is good for Forks, and you do need the tourism,” he said.
“They do need the jobs, plus they’ve got the best fishing around.
“This would be a big shot in the arm for them.”
A downside is transportation, Rau said, noting the closest railroad to Forks is in Aberdeen, 108 miles away.
But transportation may not be a deal-killer, Rau said.
“We started crunching the numbers to find out what the cost would truly be, and it actually penciled out OK, so that’s where we are now.”
In an added, positive twist, a portion of every sale of beer would be contributed to a foundation run by a Forks board of directors that would decide how the funds would be spent “for the betterment of Forks,” Rau said.
Rau said he and his business associates had been considering Forks as a possible site for a bottled-water plant for two years but decided that a brewery that produced a superior, unique product capitalizing on a rain forest origin would be a better fit.
Rau said he met in Forks on Dec. 11 with West End-area representatives.
The group included Bill Peach, Clallam County commissioner-elect and Forks Chamber of Commerce president.
Peach said the group also included Fleck, Bryon Monohon, Forks mayor; Audrey Grafstrom, Forks clerk-treasurer; Don Grafstrom, real estate broker and Forks Chamber of Commerce vice-president; and Bill Greenwood, county Economic Development Council (EDC) executive director.
Peach said the Interfor site had a particular advantage for conversion into a brewery.
“It’s hooked up to power, water everything,” Peach said.
“Everything is turnkey.”
Peach said the company would use its water quality expertise “to take the water out here and bring it to this [high] standard for water to use in beer.”
Greenwood touched on the proposal in a Dec. 18 written report to the EDC board of directors.
He noted the mid-December meeting with Rau.
“The talks were very preliminary, as the company does not have a plan in place,” Greenwood said in the report.
“The business will need to jump through several permitting issues on both the state and federal level.
“Financing the proposal also is in question.”
Rau said in an email that the company has “a general business plan that is undergoing some changes to facilitate a reliable future for our company.”
Peach said Rau made it clear at the outset of the Dec. 16 visit that bottled water was not in the cards.
“They could do the water, but the [profit] margin is in upper-end, quality beer,” Peach said.
“When we met, there was a clarification [Rau] offered in the first five minutes that he was there to talk about beer.”
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 5060, or at pgottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
