Plans for an aerobic digestion system adjacent to an innovative Spalding food processing plant have been lodged with Lincolnshire County Council.
The proposal by Naylor Nutrition – an offshoot of Naylor Farms – would see several tanks as part of the digestion process on its factory site at Rangell Gate.
The company’s new processing factory creates plant-based protein as a by-product of coleslaw manufacture.
It is the first of its kind and the protein source developed as an alternative to soy.
The outer leaves of the cabbages are not used in the creation of coleslaw as they are green, not white which is the consumer preference. The unused leaves and stems go to make the plant-based protein product.
When plans for the adjacent anaerobic digester were first revealed there was concern from residents.
District Coun Rob Gibson raised the issue at a meeting of South Holland District Council earlier this year.
But the final decision lays with the county council and licensing comes from the Environment Agency.
The plans are to be decided using delegated powers of county planning officers.
Accompanying documentation says the plant will receive ‘feedstock’ from commercial food waste principally from processing, packaging and retailing alongside crop residues from local farms.
“Renewable energy in the form of biogas will be produced and fed directly into the grid on site,” says the document.
“AD is not a new technology, it has been used in the UK since the late 1800s, but now an increasing number of AD plants are being built in the UK and Lincolnshire.”
“The process is estimated to produce 70Gwh of biomethane gas injected into the grid, 8Gwh of electrical power to be used by he adjacent factory,” the report says.
Carbon dioxide as a by-product will be liquidised to be bought by a third party to use in the food production process.
The main tanks will include two primary digestors, a secondary digestor and the whole process is ‘closed’ to reduce the risk of odour leaks.
“The proposals are considered to have a limited effect on the landscape resource and local landscape character, the change of agricultural land to commercial off set by the new planting which, over time, will reduce the impact of the development,” the report says.
The anaerobic digestion plants will operate in a closed system and waste ‘will be received in a well-designed reception handling area designed to minimise odour release,’ the report says.
Air filtration systems from a specialist company based in Sweden will be used.
Naylor Nutrition is based in a new £15m factory already built on the site which converts parts of cabbage not used in coleslaw into the protein source.
