New plant powered by whisky waste

Feasibility study helped to support the finance and sign off a £2.2 million capital project, resulting in a new AD plant being in place, commissioned and operational by June 2022.

Introduction

Abbey Ecosse is developing a modular anaerobic digestion and flexible energy network which provides alternative treatment and use of whisky co-products for small scale distilleries.

Challenge

The company plan to build a new, modular anaerobic digestion plant powered by whisky waste at Forss Business Park. They wanted to assess the environmental benefits of the proposed system, focusing of greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions compared to current disposal of the waste by direct land application, denoted ‘business as usual’ (BAU).

Solution

A detailed carbon footprint analysis was performed for the ‘business as usual’ case and eight other scenarios exploring different configurations of the anaerobic digestion plant. Each scenario showed a net carbon reduction compared to BAU and some were net negative.

Abbey Ecosse provided the details of various scenarios for plant operation. UHI and Hull academics, Finlay Kerr and Mark Walker, performed detailed analyses on these scenarios informing the construction of the plant and ensuring significant carbon reductions when the plant is in operation. The modular design of the plant and analysis mean this can be replicated at other sites.

The environmental benefits of a proposed anaerobic digestion system were analysed, focussing of greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions compared to business as usual. A lifecycle approach was taken for GHGs and 8 different scenarios were analysed and compared to BAU. Emission calculations included transport, carbon stored in soil, displacement of mineral fertiliser, agricultural land application, indirect impacts (e.g. embodied carbon of infrastructure and plant equipment), fugitive emissions and energy-related emissions.

Outcome

This study has helped to support the finance and sign off a £2.2 million capital project which is now live and will result in the plant being in place, commissioned and operational by June 2022.

The market potential is large for this type of project with at least three further potential sites identified for future regional AD treatment and energy/IB hubs associated with existing rural whisky industry locations.

The robust analysis which was conducted can be adapted and used as a framework to assess alternative arrangements and business models.