Green Power Could Be Produced From Salmon

Talks are taking place over manufacturing electricity and gas from farmed fish on Lewis, according to the Aberdeen Press and Journal.

The opportunity to use the salmon by-products has arisen with Lighthouse Caledonia intending to build a £5million plant at Arnish, south of Stornoway.

Previously, raw waste products from the company’s now empty former processing factory was stored in a tank ship and shipped to Norway every few weeks for reprocessing into feed supplements for the Danish pig farmers.

Now Lighthouse bosses are in discussions on a proposal from the Western Isles Council to divert offcuts to the local authority’s organic recycling plant, where the council has developed an innovative system to turn waste into bio-gas, electricity and hydrogen, the newspaper reported.

The organic salmon waste would be decomposed in a giant digester to produce methane. In turn, this would help power a gas engine to create electricity. Some of this electricity could be fed into the local grid or used on an eco-industrial park on-site. The rest of the energy would be used to electrolyse water to produce hydrogen.

The Hebrides have the edge on this technology particularly as fossil fuels are never used to make Hebridean hydrogen thus boosting its green credentials.

After the energy is extracted the dried salmon waste could be converted into fertiliser and compost for gardens and landscaping.

OddGeir Oddsen, managing director of Lighthouse Caledonia, said: “We have spoken to the council about its waste processing plant.

“If at some point in the future it can deal with industrial waste from our processing facility, we will happily discuss the possibility of directing waste there.”

Western Isles Council leader Angus Campbell said: “This would benefit the company in terms of disposal cost and good green energy.

“It would also help the waste conversion process offering a supply of natural input for the digester to make more it efficient and also provide a better dry product.”