Top award for Kildare energy company
Nurney company uses unsold Tesco food in its process
A Kildare company which uses unsold food from Tesco has won an award for its energy product.
The company, Nurney based Green Generation Ltd., won the Innovative Deployment of Renewable Energy Award in the 2020 SEAI Energy Awards.
SEAI is Ireland’s national energy authority investing in, and delivering, appropriate, effective, and sustainable solutions to help Ireland’s transition to a clean energy future
Green Generation Ltd is using anaerobic digestion to convert agricultural and food waste to renewable energy.
It uses unsold food from Tesco in its process.
It harnesses natural microbial activity to break down organic waste into biogas and an organic fertiliser by-product.
Half of the biogas is used to produce renewable electricity which is sent to the national grid.
The rest is upgraded to ‘biomethane’ which is injected into the natural gas grid.
Unsold food from Tesco is fed to the anaerobic digester, and the biogas generated is sold back to Tesco for use in their stores.
The plastic packaging from the food is processed to manufacture durable plastic products, using 'waste' heat from electricity generation and finally the digestate from the process is once again used as fertiliser to grow food.
Green Generation spokesperson, Billy Costello, said the award meant “an awful lot” and is “a credit to the staff who have put such effort into it down the years.”
A total of ten awards were presented to individuals, businesses, communities, and public sector organisations. The online awards ceremony was hosted by broadcast journalist, Andrea Gilligan, who was joined by Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications Eamon Ryan T.D. for a special interview.
Commenting on the leadership shown by all the finalists and winners, Minister Ryan said he believed Ireland’s energy transition is going to be good for us as a country and our people are going to be good at it.
SEAI received 124 entries to the 2020 SEAI Energy Awards with projects delivering combined energy savings of €42 million. Commenting, William Walsh, CEO of SEAI, said the next decade will demand accelerated and significant change in every part of our society to reduce our carbon emissions. SEAI will support those who want to take such action. The commitment shown by each of our finalists is hugely inspiring and now we want others to see how they too can benefit from sustainable energy.”