A Scottish biofuel company called Celtic Renewables has successfully demonstrated the concept of producing biobutanol – a hydrocarbon fuel that can be a direct replacement for gasoline and diesel – from whiskey-making byproducts. They are now moving ahead to establish an industrial-scale pilot facility.
The laboratory work used a combination of draff, which is the sugar-rich residue of barley husks used in producing whiskey, and pot ale, which is the yeasty liquid residue left in a still after whiskey is fermented.
Celtic Renewables has formed a partnership with Europe’s largest biotechnology pilot facility in Belgium known as the Bio Base Europe Pilot Plant. The BBEPP was founded to support the advancement of sustainable biobased processes that reduce the need for fossil fuels.
The plan is for Celtic Renewables to use the BBEPP facility to produce the world’s first industrial samples of vehicle fuel made from whiskey production residues. The company then plans to build its first commercial demonstration facility in Scotland. Celtic Renewables has the ambition of becoming a groundbreaking company with global reach. It would be an interesting symbiotic relationship if the long-established whiskey industry in Scotland that arguably produces the country’s finest export can became the basis (and essentially the feedstock) for a new fuel industry.
There is a great deal of interest throughout Europe in the development of sustainable bio-based industries. Making vehicle fuels from whiskey is a good example of the kind of innovative technology thinking that is getting serious attention as European countries look to eliminate their dependence upon fossil fuels.
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Whisky-powered vehicles take step closer to commercial reality
Photo, posted January 3, 2010, courtesy of Fronx via Flickr.
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Earth Wise is a production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio.