Speyside Biomass for Global Bio-chemical Supply Chains

RIPCELL transforms the waste of _today_ into the resources of _tomorrow_ by forming cross-sector alliances to improve resource efficiencies and waste disposal within Scotland bio-cluster. We employ circular economy practices to recover valuable platform chemicals from whisky distillery waste; producing pure high-grade bio-chemicals for multiple applications in industry, and returning water to distillers to be re-used in their production processes.

Every year, Scotland's distilleries produce 2.6 billions litres of effluent waste in the form of pot ale. Each litre contains (on average) 2.2g of bio-based acetic acid and 5.2g of bio-based lactic acid. Acetic acid features on the World Health Organisation's list of essential medicines and chemicals. It is also necessary for semi-conductor and circuit board manufacturing, where high purity is paramount. Bio-lactic acid is an essential chemical used in the food industry and cosmetics/personal care sectors. This project aims to end the waste of these vital chemicals and purify them for future use as ingredients in high value industries.

RIPCELL are working with several stakeholders in Speyside, Scotland to scale-up the processing of pot ale to 25 tonnes per hour (at the CorDe, Rothes site) - producing up to 1,850 tonnes of bio-based chemicals per annum and saving 200,000,000 litres of clean water for the site/s involved.

This will create a new and improved supply chain for the ingredients, pharmaceutical and electronics industries. We are currently working with AB Agri, Associated British Foods, Plater Group LtD and various cosmetics companies to build out potential distribution networks.

In addition to premium grade bio-based chemical outputs, this project will result in clean water for our collaborating industries to re-use on-site, and our other by-products can be used in AD plants to produce biogas. This will reduce the carbon footprint of the chemical manufacturing industry as our bio-based carbon-negative...