One of the major by-products of the brewing industry around the world is spent grain.

Every litre of beer produces about 200 grams of spent grain; multiply that across the industry and you have thousands of tonnes in Western Australia alone.

Most brewers see it as a problem and, at best, the spent grain is used as feed in the farm sector or, at worst, dumped in landfill.

Spinifex Brewing Co, by contrast, has teamed up with other Perth businesses to pursue what it sees as a big opportunity.

It revolves around black soldier flies and their capacity to feed on agricultural waste to produce larvae and excrement rich in protein.

Participants in the project include C-Wise, an organic recycling and composting business led by chief executive Greg Watts.

Another participant is insect-breeding business Arvela, which was formerly known as Future Green Solutions but opted last year for a new name that, fittingly, is a scrambling of larvae.

Also involved is A Little Wild Australia, a new venture formed by the team behind Spinifex Brewing, including Mick Little, John Gibbs and Steve Jansen.

They have brought in Trent Carroll, the former Dockers and Eagles player, who is now better known for kicking goals in wineries and distilleries.

If all goes to plan, Singapore startup Fungi Infinity, which is pursuing similar opportunities in that market, will also be involved.

Luke Wheat, who has been running Arvela since 2012, said the proposed venture was built on sound foundations.

“This collaboration is reimagining things that already exist,” he said.

“The botanicals industry exists, the soil market exists, the feed market exists, the waste industry is there.

“It’s just about how do you arrange those things in a more sensible and sustainable way?”

He is excited by the opportunity.

“The big thing that drove me to establish Arvela is that we have really big sustainability outcomes that we need to hit as a society, and we can only do that at scale, and to get there you can’t rely on goodwill and philanthropy,” Mr Wheat said.

“It has to be underpinned by a robust economic model, and that is what’s really exciting about this collaboration.

“It’s a really multi-faceted approach to waste management and the value you can bring.”

Steve Jansen, who was a co-founder of both Spinifex and ALWA, saw the opportunity after meeting with other businesses in related sectors.

These included Fungi Infinity in Singapore and local entrepreneur Nick Stamatiou, who heads up Whole Green Foods.

They both spoke to him about black soldier fly (BSF) technology and referred him to Arvela, as local experts in BSF and suppliers of BSF eggs and larvae.

That led to meetings with C-Wise, which is planning a major expansion of its operations at Keralup, near Mandurah.

Mr Watts said the opportunity for waste treatment using BSF technology came from an aggregation of like-minded people. 

“We only met the Spinifex guys about fifteen months ago and it grew from there,” he said.

“This is really exciting stuff. 

“This is what the government needs us to do if we want to hit our 2030 targets.

“And they need to get on board and support it, really quickly.” 

The project will use a containerised, modular technology that boosts the efficiency growing the larvae.

Mr Watts believes the oil extracted from BSF larvae, aka maggot goo, has applications as diverse as construction materials, health supplements, bioplastics and animal feed.

In the case of spent brewery grain, he plans to turn it into a high-value protein oil and powder.

“It’s a fantastic product because maggots are high in protein and have a small carbon footprint,” Mr Watts said.

“By using maggots as natural waste recyclers, the need for traditional protein sources like soy or fishmeal, which require vast amounts of land, water and energy to produce, is significantly reduced.”

C-Wise plans to start with a pilot-scale plant to process up to 500 tonnes a year of spent grain from breweries.

The plan builds on substantial research into BSF technology.

In 2020, the federal government, through its AgriFutures program, awarded a $2.5 million grant to a consortium to develop solutions for agricultural waste disposal using BSF technology.

That consortium was led by Australian Pork Ltd and included Arvela as the commercial partner and The University of Western Australia as the research lead.

Project leader Sasha Jenkins described black soldier fly farming as an emerging industry.

“Black soldier flies feed on agricultural waste, and the resulting larvae and their excrement is rich in protein,” Dr Jenkins said.

“Through black soldier fly farming, farmers can convert agricultural waste into high-quality fertilisers and potential protein sources for livestock feed.”

Next level

A Little Wild Australia, led by Yamatji man Michael Little, has plans to take the new venture to another level.

He was one of the founders of Spinifex Brewing, which uses native botanicals in many of its brews.

“We thought how can we extend that beyond Spinifex,” Mr Little said

“Our plan is to grow botanicals and look at value-add products we can develop from that.

“It could be lip balms, deodorants, coffee.”

Working with C-Wise and Arvela, it is also aiming to produce a branded stockfeed.

Mr Carroll has been brought in to lead the development of skincare products from the BSF larvae oil.

“We connected with Trent a few years ago when he produced our non-alcoholic Kakadu plum-infused ginger beer,” Mr Little said.

Mr Carroll has since been chief winemaker at McHenry Hohnen Wines, established Rok Kombucha in Margaret River and worked with Banks and Bloom distillery, which also uses native botanicals as a key ingredient in its gin and vodka products.

Another layer to the project is job creation.

“John (Gibbs) and I have been collaborating for fifteen years on Aboriginal workforce development and employment strategies,” Mr Little said.

“That is one of the pillars of the project.

“We will have young people developing skills in caring for country with the botanicals at the Keralup site and skills in managing the whole BSF waste management process.

“The whole industry is starting to grow. It feels like we on the crest of a wave.”

Mr Little said there were longer-term opportunities for Aboriginal businesses to be involved in the project’s supply chain.

“We will make sure whatever we do in that space provides a real outcome for Indigenous communities and Indigenous suppliers,” he said.

His ambitions dovetail with a training program that Pinjarra Senior High School delivers for its year 11 and 12 students at C-Wise.

The students are provided opportunities to work with C-Wise as a step toward completing Cert 1 and Cert 2 qualifications in agricultural studies.

C-Wise has 250 hectares of cleared farmland at Keralup and needs only 12ha for its core composting operations, leaving plenty of scope to propagate botanicals.

“As we realise we can’t eat money, we are getting back to the old ways of working the land,” Mr Watts said.

“If you look at the botanicals that Little Wild wants to produce, we need a new generation with a new skill set around plant husbandry, how to harvest it, how to distil the oils out of it.

“That creates an opportunity for young people in the Peel region to work on the land.”

He said an advantage of C-Wise’s Keralup site was its proximity to Spinifex’s brewery, which has been built at the recently established Food Innovation Precinct near Mandurah.

The precinct includes the Sustainable Innovative Food Technologies Centre, which is being delivered by Murdoch University and aims to transform ingredients produced by famers into value-added food products using new technologies.

The proximity of C-Wise and Spinifex addresses one of the hidden costs in the waste management sector.

“If we truly want to decarbonise, we need to get rid of the trucks that are carting this waste miles away,” Mr Watts said.

“And don’t just dump it in holes in the ground.”

He said black soldier flies provided a potential solution to another chronic issue in the waste recycling sector: the contamination of organic waste with plastics, glass and other materials.

The black soldier flies simply eat around the contaminants.

“This is the next step in us being able to access alternative waste streams using alternative technology that has been proven in Australia and around the world,” Mr Watts said.

“And, hopefully, solve the kerbside food organics contamination issue.

“And come out with a product that goes back into farmland to grow really good food.”

To realise its ambitions, the WA consortium is seeking WA government support for its pilot plant, which is budgeted to cost about $400,000.

In addition, C-Wise and ALWA have an alliance with Singapore’s Fungi Infinity that includes a proposed collaboration under the Australian/Singaporean Go Green Co innovation program.

The Australian and Singaporean governments have set aside $20 million for grants under this program.