Enorm completes large-scale insect production facility in Denmark

13-Dec-2023 - Last updated on 13-Dec-2023 at 14:53 GMT

Inside the new Enorm Black Solider Fly production facility, said to the largest plant of its kind in Northern Europe © Enorm

Enorm's production facility in Denmark has finally been completed. It is scheduled to go into operation in early 2024.

Located in Eastern Jutland, the facility covers 22,000 square meters and will produce over 10,000 tons of Black Soldier Fly (BSF) derived insect meal annually.

Enorm was established in 2017. The leadership behind it consists of CEO, Carsten Lind Pedersen, and COO, Jane Lind Sam, a father and daughter team, along with Arne Holst Lauridsen, who is CTO.

The construction of the insect factory got underway in early 2022, with various stakeholders involved during the process, including Danish agribusiness giant, DLG, which became a co-owner of Enorm in January last year. Big Dutchman spinout, Better Insect Solutions, has also been supporting Enorm for many years.

The COO told FeedNavigator that the facility includes a specialized BSF larvae ventilation system, fly cage equipment and growth crates, which were all developed in cooperation with SKOV, along with air cleaning and heat recovery from INNO+ with Sealing System looking after the full automation and logistics side of the operation.

Enorm, she added, expects to harvest the first larvae from the facilities in February, but it needs to finalize certain regulatory steps before it can sell any products. "Ramp up will begin in February and go on until May."

father and daughter team — At the factory opening last week, Enorm CEO, Carsten Lind Pedersen [pictured here with his daughter and Enorm COO, Jane Lind Sam], said after many years of hard work to get to this point, the focus now is on gearing up full-scale production.

Trials

The Enorm team outlined how its insect meal and oil have already shown promising results in test trials on farms. Its ingredients are targeted at feed for pigs, poultry, fish, and pets.

The startup ran trials on its BSF meal in collaboration with the National Institute of Aquatic Resources at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU) with the data showing good digestibility for the product in trout and tilapia.

Danish fish feed manufacturer, Aller Aqua, has also been carrying out validation work in relation to Enorm's fish feed research efforts.

Larver_2[1] — After approximately 12 days of rearing, the BSF larvae are processed into oil and protein.

Upcycling leftovers from food industry

The BSF larvae, of which 36,000 tons per year will be processed, are fed primarily through by-products from the food industry, and it is in that context that Arla Foods Ingredients has teamed up with Enorm. It is a partnership the dairy company claims will significantly reduce food waste.

Delactosed permeate (DLP) is a residual dairy stream generated in large volumes during lactose production. Most DLP is currently used as material for biogas production, which is a less preferable option than re-use for animal feed as per the EU food waste hierarchy.

Arla has long been investigating ways to address this challenge, but DLP’s composition has previously made it difficult to use in livestock feed.

Having developed the capacity to turn DLP into nutritious feed for BSF larvae, the processor began supplying Enorm with DLP for trial production a few years ago. Now with the BSF facility scaling up, the amount of DLP that Arla will deliver to the insect meal producer will increase substantially – to 15 truckloads a week from early 2024.

Sønke Møller, senior sales developer at Arla Foods Ingredients, said the collaboration is a “fantastic example of companies working together to make upcycling a reality.”

Because its destination will be feed rather than biogas, Arla said this tie-up will also allow DLP to move up in the waste hierarchy and will enable its Denmark protein facility to achieve a 16% reduction in food waste.