The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Major pellet producer bought in £50mmove
INVESTMENT: German off-grid energy firm Arensis invests in Grangemouth site
A Scottish producer of biomass wood pellets has been bought over as part of a £50 million UK investment package by German group Arensis.
The off-grid energy generation group has acquired the Verdo pellet plant at Grangemouth from Verdo Renewables.
The facility produces more than 60,000 tonnes of wood pellets every year from virgin materials sourced locally from sustainably managed woodland.
Stuart Banks, executive vicepresident of UK operations and former Grangemouth plant director, said joining Arensis was a positive move.
“By bringing the Verdo pellet plant into Arensis’ portfolio, we can streamline the entire process of off-grid energy generation, integrating fuel production, technology deployment, logistics and project management into one sustainable, country level operation.”
Arensis said all jobs at Grangemouth were safe and it hoped to add to the workforce in the near future.
It is also investing in the site to install 30 Entrade biomass generators to power manufacturing operations and cut its own carbon footprint. ”
“This development is really significant for our business growth in the UK, and for our ability to help UK companies cut their emissions,” said Julien Uhlig, chief executive of Arensis and Entrade.
“Verdo’s pellets are by far the best we tested in the UK, offering about 20% more energy over imported pellets.
“There is a lot of biomass generation that relies on importing biomass from abroad, undermining sustainability, and compromising efficiency due to pellet deterioration in transit.
“We don’t believe in shipping fuel around the world when local resources are available. We are committed to using local, sustainable sources for our biomass, reducing the transport carbon footprint and maintaining local jobs.
“This site meets our needs in terms of production, but also provides particularly reliable feedstocks.
“This is important because having a good baseline product allows us to carry out better comparative research on new feedstocks, especially waste products which we want to help customers turn into biomass fuel.
“The UK has now become our business and technology testing site.”
Arensis also operates a sizeable biomass research institute at the Knowlsey Industrial Park near Liverpool.
The firm recently installed 32 biomass conversion units at two UK sites of frozen food company Greenyard, which are estimated to save 10,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions per year.