Farmgen plans £20m expansion
A LANCASHIRE ‘energy farming’ company has unveiled ambitious expansion plans to build up to nine new plants across the country, investing around £20m.
Blackpool-based anaerobic digestion company Farmgen, set-up in February last year with investment from four local private investors, is building one of its rural power plants in Warton, near Preston, and has applied for permission to create another at Dryholme Farm, near Silloth in Cumbria.
Plans are still at an early stage, but the scheme is expected to be broadly similar to Farmgen’s Fyle project at Carr Farm, near Warton, which is costing £2.5m and is set to come on stream in 2010.
That plant is set to create 1MW, which will then be exported to the National Grid, providing enough continuous electricity for more than 1,000 homes.
Farrmgen has ambitious expansion plans for the next year, with several other projects in the pipeline and the company said planning applications are being prepared for two more AD plants on the Fylde Coast and in Staffordshire.
It has also revealed it has five more potential sites in Lancashire and Cumbria. It said more farmers become aware of the financial prospects AD plants can provide. Farm operations in Dorset and Kent have also expressed an interest, it added.
Finance for this ambitious growth would come from a mixture of private and bank investment, the company said.
AD Plants use maize, grass silage and other crops from fields surrounding the farm, as well as some animal slurries, to create biogas, which is then used to generate electricity. This is then exported to the National Grid. The bio-fertiliser residue is used on the land to help grow the following season’s maize crop.
Ed Cattigan, chief operating officer of Farmgen, said: “At the moment 2010 is looking to be an exciting year for us – with the AD plant we are building at Warton coming on stream and a growing number of other projects across the UK.
“There is no doubt more and more farmers across the country are now looking at AD plants as a way of giving them a sustainable and secure form of income, whilst bringing marginal land back into play.”
He added: “Any plans which we progress with will support the rural economy, bring redundant fields back into production and create an eco-friendly plant that will not be intrusive to people living in the area.”
