There is an undulating, skinny ribbon of asphalt running along the north shore of Loch Sunart. It’s barely wide enough for one vehicle, let alone two, but it stretches all the way out t
o the most westerly point in mainland Great Britain. In this stunning locale, distilling is set to commence at the brand new Ardnamurchan Distillery in Glenbeg, Lochaber. The independent bottlers Adelphi Distilling Ltd will finally see their dream realized and join the rank of those who can proudly call themselves distillers. This is no farm distillery by any stretch of the imagination. Underneath the twin pagodas, the Ardnamurchan Distillery will have the capacity to make 500,000 liters of alcohol per year.
Graeme Bowie
Distillery manager Graeme Bowie gave me a tour of the site. He was assistant manager at Balblair Distillery for six years, and has progressed his way to distillery manager from distillery operator following six years at Balmenach and sixteen years at Glen Grant. As you might imagine, he is relishing the job at hand.
The distillery will produce peated and unpeated Ardnamurchan whisky in equal quantities, although at the outset, Graeme predicts it could be eight years until the company considers the whisky to be ready for release. Boldly, there will be no gin or other distractions produced for short-term cash. They are straightforward whisky men; nothing more, nothing less. Meanwhile, there will be a visitors center with a bar and tasting area where you will be able to find Adelphi’s latest independent cask strength bottlings.
The company is named after the Adelphi distillery, a Lowland distillery that operated on the south side of the River Clyde in Glasgow from 1826 until 1907, drawing its water from Loch Katrine. In its day, it had two mash tuns, up to twelve washbacks, and two stillhouses containing a Coffey still and four pot stills. In addition, the 19th century Adelphi distillery boasted its own cooperage and maltings (though the bulk of the malt came from Port Dundas). When Alfred Barnard paid a visit in the 1880s, Archibald Walker & Co, then Adelphi’s proprietors, owned Limerick Distillery, Ireland and the Vauxhall Distillery in Liverpool, England. The Adelphi name was revived in 1993 by Archibald Walker’s great grandson.
Like other newly opened distilleries, Ardnamurchan will have a private cask ownership scheme whereby whisky enthusiasts and clubs can order a cask of peated or unpeated spirit filled into either a bourbon barrel or sherry butt. Final prices are being confirmed, but they are expected to be approximately £1,750 for the bourbon barrel and £5,000 for the sherry butt, so it should prove popular.
Inside the biomass burner
Graeme pointed out their four 15,000 ton grain silos, which will receive the barley deliveries. With different malt specifications, supplies will come from Bairds Malt, and from malting on site. Production will begin with milling in the compact Alan Ruddock AR2000 four roller mill, the same model as you will find at Wolfburn distillery. Adelphi have installed a two-ton, copper-topped, semi-lauter mashtun with a manhole and double hatch. Power will come from the Swiss-built, one megawatt Schmid biomass wood chip burner, whose fiery hunger will be fueled by the local forestry companies. The yawning hatch to the deep pit of the chip store in the yard is motor-driven and opens effortlessly at the touch of button, like the malevolent plaything of a Bond villain. The burner can take up to an hour to get up to its running temperature of 800°C, but then it will reliably produce steam bountifully. This is conveyed to the space age looking Steam Accumulator.
Ardnamurchan’s pagodas
Each heating tank holds 9,000 liters of water in preparation for mashing. The first water will be 6,500 liters at 65°C, followed by a second water of 4,000 liters which will slosh in at 82°C. The 6,500 liters of the third water will gush in at 90°C. Production will start modestly at one or two mashes per week, but in time, production will be ramped up to six days a week.
Unique to Scotland, the fermentation will be carried out in four oak washbacks resized from ex-cognac vats by the J. Dias cooperage in Paramos, Portugal, plus three Forsyth-built, stainless steel washbacks complete with switchers. Anchor dried yeast will be used (10 kg for every 10,000 liters). The fermentation times are planned to be reassuringly long to build flavor, envisaged to be 55 hours for the short runs, then 88-90 hours for long runs over the weekend.
The pair of virgin copper stills look magnificent. Built by the experienced coppersmiths of Forsyths, they sit resplendent behind picture windows. The wash still holds 10,000 liters and has a silhouette reminiscent of those at Highland Park. Meanwhile, the spirit still has a body contoured like the Glen Grant stills, and has a capacity of 6,000 liters. Everything is controlled by hand, so you will find no automation here. The vapors will funnel down a Lyne arm sloping away at 15° into two shell and tube condensers tucked away at the back, before the spirit is pumped into the spirit receiver warehouse vat.
The first delivery of American oak barrels has already arrived from Jack Daniel. Ardnamurchan’s traditional dunnage warehouse will bear casks three racks high, but it is eerily empty at the moment. The steel frame of the warehouse is covered with Kingspan; insulated, metallic panels to help keep a cool, damp interior temperature for maturation. Eventually, the warehouse will hold 6,500 casks over two floors but it will take six years to fill up before they need to build another one.
The warehouse footprint has been physically hewn out of the solid rock of the hillside, some 12 meters deep. The excavated rock has been utilized to lay a rough road up to the distillery’s water source. Before I depart, Graeme zooms me a mile up the bumpy track in an all terrain vehicle to show me the source of the production water from the Glenmore River.
As the inaugural distillation is still a few weeks away, the only undertaking I’m denied today is a taste of the new make Ardnamurchan spirit. However, that intrigue gives me the perfect excuse to return.
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