Plans for a €50 million bioprocessing facility in Carlow which will be used by Irish universities, Teagasc and businesses to convert biomass materials into products usually made from fossil fuels, like plastics, were unveiled yesterday.
Prof Jimmy Burke, head of the Crops Research Centre in Oak Park, gave details of the proposed facility at the Bioenergy '07 open day event in Oak Park, which was attended by over 8,000 people.
Prof Burke explained that many of the products made from petrochemicals could also be produced using biomass - trees, grass, agricultural crops or other biological material - using new technologies in the "second-generation" use of biomass.
"With biomass you can grow it, cut it, harvest it and burn it for energy in specially adapted boilers or power stations. The second phase is that before you burn, you take that biomass and put it through a bioprocessing factory, where the high element constituents of the biomass are extracted," he said.
He explained that this could be fibre or starter chemical, or a range of new products.
"By integrating a variety of biomass conversion processes, all of these products can be made in one facility and Ireland has a major advantage because it is not only the world's top producer of biomass, but was well up with the new science technologies," he said.
"Researchers at Carlow IT and Teagasc's National Crops Research Centre in Carlow and UCD, TCD, Cork and Maynooth universities are already working on some components of this technology, but significant investment in a state of the art bioprocessing facility is required," he added.
"Ireland can become a major player in this regard and we have had discussions with major international companies and the co-operatives and Irish agribusinesses."
The plan for the facility has been submitted to Enterprise Ireland. Prof Burke envisaged that the proposed bioprocessing facility would also contain a pilot plant laboratory.
Businesses would be able to lease the space and equipment to develop or scale up new projects or to optimise existing processes.
At the event, which was jointly organised by Teagasc, COFORD - the National Council for Forest Research and Development and Sustainable Energy Ireland, Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture and Food Mary Wallace also announced grants of €500,000 for biomass harvesting machinery.
The grants will provide up to 40 per cent of the purchase price of four self-contained whole-tree chippers and one medium-sized mobile wood chipper to assist developing enterprises in the wood-chip supply sector.
Teagasc's head of forestry, Nuala Ní Fhlatharta, said there were 620,000 hectares of forestry in Ireland and the emerging wood energy market was providing an important outlet for thinnings from these forests.
While replacing imported fossils fuels, the increased use of wood chip, wood pellet and log burners is providing an opportunity to add value to locally produced raw material, she added.
Teagasc energy crop specialist Barry Caslin said farmers were reacting to the demand for energy crops and the hectares of willow and miscanthus grown in Ireland had increased from 300 in 2006 to 1,100 this year.
He said the area of oilseed rape, used to produce liquid biofuel, rose from 4,000 hectares in 2006 to 6,000 hectares harvested in 2007.
The event, now in its second year, also featured over 70 trade and information stands, displaying the latest alternative energy equipment.