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Bartlett Grain Company describes $440 million soybean crushing facility in Cherryvale to Senate committee
Summary
Company executives told the Senate Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee that Bartlett Grain’s new Cherryvale, Kansas, soybean crushing plant is a $440 million investment that expands in-state processing capacity, supports local farmers and rail infrastructure, and could be expanded later to support renewable fuel production.
Bill Webster, vice president of Bartlett Grain Company, and Dustin Brevard, who leads Bartlett’s soybean crushing business, briefed the Senate Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee about the company’s new soybean crushing facility in Cherryvale, Kansas.
Bartlett described the project as a $440,000,000 investment that increases Kansas soybean crushing capacity by more than 40 percent. The company said the Cherryvale plant can crush nearly 50,000,000 bushels of soybeans per year and produce roughly 500,000,000 pounds of soybean oil, more than 1,000,000 tons of soybean meal and about 75,000 tons of soybean hulls annually. Bartlett said the meal produced at the plant feeds the rations of an estimated 100,000,000 chickens each year and the hulls feed roughly 60,000 head of cattle.
The committee heard that the site is a high‑capacity logistics hub. Bartlett representatives said the Cherryvale facility has over 25,000 feet of track space and is a shuttle unloader/loader, able to unload a 100‑car train of soybeans while loading a 100‑car train of soybean meal. The company told senators the plant routinely produces the equivalent of a 100‑car unit of soybean meal about every three days.
Webster and Brevard told the committee the company employs more than 70 workers on site and selected Cherryvale because of its access to a strong local labor pool, utility infrastructure and a rail network served by WATCO with interchanges to Class I railroads including Canadian Pacific, Kansas City Southern, Union Pacific and BNSF. Company witnesses said the plant will improve market bids across multiple Bartlett facilities in Kansas by keeping soybeans in‑state for value‑added processing instead of exporting whole beans for crushing elsewhere.
Bartlett also described how the Cherryvale site was laid out to allow future expansion. The company said the plant was designed to double capacity on the same site as market conditions dictate and that adjacent ground has been purchased and permitted by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment for a potential renewable‑fuels facility. Company representatives said the neighboring project, if built, would produce renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel at roughly 20,000 barrels per day and could use soybean oil and other feedstocks to reduce carbon intensity by about 30 percent, but they said construction timing depends on federal incentive rules and policy clarity.
Senators on the Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee asked questions about permitting, rail and the state’s incentive toolkit. Bartlett witnesses credited local and state partners — Montgomery County, the Kansas Department of Commerce and the lieutenant governor’s office — for helping secure the site and rail improvements. The company said it expects additional private investment in rail infrastructure in the region and noted that the project was one of the largest private investments in Kansas agriculture in recent years.
Webster invited committee members to tour the Cherryvale facility and said Bartlett would also present to the House Agriculture Committee later the same day.
