BNM AD plant outside Portlaoise

jaymla627

Interesting to see they have secured planning from the county council for this, wouldn’t be a million miles away from it, but am scratching the head wondering where they are going to get the land needed to spread the digestate, and secure forage crops, in what is a extremely intensively farmed area with massive competition for land and a lot of large dairy herds in the area competing for any land that comes up

bogman_bass

jaymla627 wrote: »

Interesting to see they have secured planning from the county council for this, wouldn’t be a million miles away from it, but am scratching the head wondering where they are going to get the land needed to spread the digestate, and secure forage crops, in what is a extremely intensively farmed area with massive competition for land and a lot of large dairy herds in the area competing for any land that comes up

Food waste?

FintanMcluskey

bogman_bass wrote: »

Food waste?

There is an AD facility in Portlaw that consumes a lot of food waste from this country.

I wonder how much food waste is produced in Ireland?

timple23

Food waste, biosolids, pig slurry

memorystick

jaymla627 wrote: »

Interesting to see they have secured planning from the county council for this, wouldn’t be a million miles away from it, but am scratching the head wondering where they are going to get the land needed to spread the digestate, and secure forage crops, in what is a extremely intensively farmed area with massive competition for land and a lot of large dairy herds in the area competing for any land that comes up

Can local farmers just draw the slurry from it? Be a big saving on fertiliser if they could.

memorystick

jaymla627 wrote: »

Interesting to see they have secured planning from the county council for this, wouldn’t be a million miles away from it, but am scratching the head wondering where they are going to get the land needed to spread the digestate, and secure forage crops, in what is a extremely intensively farmed area with massive competition for land and a lot of large dairy herds in the area competing for any land that comes up

Can local farmers just draw the slurry from it? Be a big saving on fertiliser if they could.

richie123

I'd love to see the economic s behind it.
They sound like a very foolish idea.

I mean the diesal time and energy used in construction and running a plant that then burns a gas in engines(not exactly emission free)is it actually helping in the fight against climate change?
Not to mind competition for land in already in demand areas ..sounds like a nutjob idea.

No doubt it will be heavily subsidised by all of us through our pso levies.

Dinzee Conlee

richie123 wrote: »

I'd love to see the economic s behind it.
They sound like a very foolish idea.

I mean the diesal time and energy used in construction and running a plant that then burns a gas in engines(not exactly emission free)is it actually helping in the fight against climate change?
Not to mind competition for land in already in demand areas ..sounds like a nutjob idea.

No doubt it will be heavily subsidised by all of us through our pso levies.

But if they are looking for inputs of slurry, doesn’t it make sense to put it in an intensively farmed area?

Is Portloaise a handy place to get to from all directions if stuff was trucked in?

Am sure it’ll add more pressure to land in the area though, if lads start to grow beet or similar to feed it...

You hear conflicting reports of whether these are actually a good idea or not?
I have a feeling they might be a good idea on a small scale, where they could be fed with locally produced slurry/food.
But, does the economics of building mean small scale just isn’t feasible?

Water John

Are BNM linked to the consortium along with a number of the milk processors proposing the AD plants around the country, providing renewable natural gas?

richie123

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

But if they are looking for inputs of slurry, doesn’t it make sense to put it in an intensively farmed area?

Is Portloaise a handy place to get to from all directions if stuff was trucked in?

Am sure it’ll add more pressure to land in the area though, if lads start to grow beet or similar to feed it...

You hear conflicting reports of whether these are actually a good idea or not?
I have a feeling they might be a good idea on a small scale, where they could be fed with locally produced slurry/food.
But, does the economics of building mean small scale just isn’t feasible?

Most ad plants need a combination of feedstuffs not just slurry ...maize and silage silage has to be good quality too

jaymla627

Dinzee Conlee wrote: »

But if they are looking for inputs of slurry, doesn’t it make sense to put it in an intensively farmed area?

Is Portloaise a handy place to get to from all directions if stuff was trucked in?

Am sure it’ll add more pressure to land in the area though, if lads start to grow beet or similar to feed it...

You hear conflicting reports of whether these are actually a good idea or not?
I have a feeling they might be a good idea on a small scale, where they could be fed with locally produced slurry/food.
But, does the economics of building mean small scale just isn’t feasible?

Beet if you can get it, is making 40 euro washed here at present, I think it needs to be going into a ad plant at 30 euro washed and delivered to be any way viable, the biggest issue would be securing enough land to spread the liquid slurry left over that isn’t digest, they will obviously want lads to be importing the slurry and thus eating up their nitrates allowance, their is literally no land in the surrounding area in a 30 mile radius that wouldn’t freely make 250 euro a acre plus for conacre if it was available which it isn’t

ruwithme

If I'm not mistaken a small waste disposal company,family owned here in Cavan tried for many years to get planning for a ad plant.

Spent a lot of money on it.other posters may know more on it than me.have they given up on the idea i don't know,but imagine it's big money investment anyway & maybe something only the likes of bnm would be allowed crack on with.

Birdnuts

jaymla627 wrote: »

Interesting to see they have secured planning from the county council for this, wouldn’t be a million miles away from it, but am scratching the head wondering where they are going to get the land needed to spread the digestate, and secure forage crops, in what is a extremely intensively farmed area with massive competition for land and a lot of large dairy herds in the area competing for any land that comes up

I thought that plant would be taking in "brown bin" waste rather that silage??

You are right though about other biomethane plants that have recently got PP in the likes of Cork. The economics and environmental sustainability of growing and transporting large amounts of intensive grass silage to such plants look rather dubious to say the least.

Fullbore2

richie123 wrote: »

I'd love to see the economic s behind it.
They sound like a very foolish idea.

I mean the diesal time and energy used in construction and running a plant that then burns a gas in engines(not exactly emission free)is it actually helping in the fight against climate change?
Not to mind competition for land in already in demand areas ..sounds like a nutjob idea.

No doubt it will be heavily subsidised by all of us through our pso levies.

Proposed plant is a biomethane gas to grid plant, not the conventional AD plant model that generates electricity by running generators that has been used in northern Ireland. Design for plant is accept food/brown bin waste (hence all the objections) along with some agricultural wastes, it is not designed to take in silage/maize so is not in competition with local agriculture. All information freely available on Laois planning website. Currently no subsidies for AD plants in Ireland, any future subsidies will likely be based on a sliding scale depending on how much waste the plant takes in. If any new agricultural AD plant does start up in Ireland it will have to take in agricultural waste to avail of any grants, the days of filling them soley with maize and silage is gone and is being phased out in the UK and Germany.

jaymla627

Birdnuts wrote: »

I thought that plant would be taking in "brown bin" waste rather that silage??

You are right though about other biomethane plants that have recently got PP in the likes of Cork. The economics and environmental sustainability of growing and transporting large amounts of intensive grass silage to such plants look rather dubious to say the least.

That seems to be their main source alright with it topped up with slurry and whatever else they can get their hands on, it’s batsh^*t crazy that they expect farmers will be lining up to take the bio slurry as they elegantly call it and pay them for it on top of haulage and spreading fees, I’m not sure if a dairy farmer for instance would even be allowed to use the above slurry as the brown waste element of it might mean the slurry can’t be used to produce milk going into the food chain, as is the case with treated human sludge which isn’t allowed and could itself be used in the ad plant....