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Springbank Peat Reek

Writer's picture: Ernie - Ernst ScheinerErnie - Ernst Scheiner

Updated: 5 days ago

....a few thoughts



by Ernie Scheiner



The Springbank Distillery in Campbeltown is one of the few Scottish distilleries that covers all of its malt requirements in the traditional way, using its own malting floor and kiln. Only the Glengyle distillery, which belongs to the Springbank group distilling Kilkerran spirits, obtains the non-peated malt it needs from Scottish industrial malsters. Ardnamurchan, Balvenie, Benriach, Bowmore, Highland Park, Kilchoman, Laphroaig and Lochlea operate traditional floor malting systems. For a special 1927 experiment, Daftmill malted its own barley in the barn for a short period.



Barley is malted


Before processing barley into spirit it has to be malted. It can be either malted on a traditional malt floor or malted industrially in drums (at Glenesk), Saladin boxes (at Blair's in Inverness) or in GKV or GV (at Roseisle).


At Springbank distillery there are two malt floors in operation.


The ideal germination temperature for barley is between 16 and 18°C, and 6 to 8°C in winter. At Springbank, this is controlled manually by simply opening or closing the many windows in the malting floors. There is no air conditioning. In the kiln, the drying room, the green malt is dried with or without peat smoke. In the Springbank variant, a dark peat from Tomintoul (formerly from the peat beds north of Machrishanish airport) is burned for the first six hours, then the malt is dried for thirty hours with neutral warm air below 65°C - so that the enzymes are preserved.


First, however, a dry peat is smoked, then the wet peat: Springbank's peat malt reaches a phenol content of 12 to 15 ppm (formerly 15 to 20 ppm or just 7 to 8 ppm) and Longrow's 50 to 55 ppm (formerly 60 ppm). The malted barley for the triple distilled Hazelburn whisky is dried exclusively in neutral warm air.


Misako Udo gives the following data in her compendium The Scottish Distilleries (2006):


Drying Process: Dried for 6 hours over peat then over an oil-fired source 18-24 hours.
Peat Source: At nearby Campbeltown Airport (two men cut the peat in April)...
PPM...: 7-8ppm (formerly 15-20ppm...


Peated Springbank Whisky

In modern times, the first Longrow heavily peated malt appeared in 1973 and complemented the traditionally slightly smoky Springbank Single Malt (12-15 ppm, 2024). In the kiln, the drying of the green malt is first carried out by exposing it to peat smoke for six hours and then dried for 30 hours with indirectly heated air.


The portfolio was expanded in 1997 with the non-peated, triple-distilled Hazelburn.


The peat for the Longrow Malt (40-45 ppm, in 2024) came from the Tomintoul Moss in Speyside in the 1970s. In the initial phase in the kiln, the green malt is exposed to 'cool' peat smoke for 48 hours. The malt to be kiln dried is turned several times during this phase by hand shovel. Previously: 36 to 48 hours under peat smoke and then 58 hours of indirect drying. The result was a phenol density of 55 ppm in the malt. In the final whisky, the phenols/cresols reach a density of around 8 to 12 ppm.



Tomintoul Moss which is originally a bassin bog with sphagnum peat keeping a lot of water.


The Springbank Malting Floors were apparently out of use from 1967 to 1977. They were in a sorry state when Frank McHardy found them. The malt at that time came from industrial malthouses. It was not until John McDougall arrived in 1992 that the barley was gradually malted again on the renovated threshing floor. It is reported that up until the turn of the millennium the "sandy" peat sometimes came from the Laggan fields.



Steeping Times
Steeping Times

 Malting Floor at Springbank 2014
Malting Floor at Springbank 2014

Where does peat actually come from today?


In the past, the distilleries in Campbeltown burned tons of peat from the surrounding area. Most of it has now been used up. They therefore source the peat from other regions of Scotland. The peat remains today can no longer be used because their structure consists essentially of fine, rotted earth. According to available documents, the last attempts were apparently unsuccessful. Local Laggan Peat was apparently used for the peating of the Local Barley release in 1966. The Local Barley bottle stated that the barley grew on Machrie Farm, among other places, and that the peat was cut in Aros Moss near Rhoin, near Rhoin Farm, northwest of Campbeltown's former military airport.



Dry Peat (oben); Wet Peat (unten). Photo Courtesy Graham Fraser
Dry Peat (oben); Wet Peat (unten). Photo Courtesy Graham Fraser


"Here at Springbank, the production team employs different methods to dry the barley depending on which whiskey is being produced, creating contrast between our three distinct malts.

Peat stored by the malt barns is transferred by wheelbarrow to the kiln, where it is used to dry the barley which is being malted for Springbank and Longrow.


48 hours of peat smoke is used when drying our peated Longrow, and 6 hours of peat smoke , followed by up to 30 hours of hot air, for lightly peated Springbank.


No peat is used in the production of Hazelburn, which instead uses hot air alone for 30 hours to dry the barley during malting."

Source: Springbank on Twitter



Photos Courtesy Springbank Distillers.





"We have trusted suppliers in other parts of the country who will transport it to us if needed.
Today our peat comes from two locations in the north of Scotland.
We use both dry peat and wet peat, which is called 'dross'.
The dry peat is used first to generate heat and the dross is added to create more smoke."

The peat reek rising through the kiln floor gives the malt the fine smoky notes that characterize the new make after lautering, fermentation and distillation.


The dry peat is sourced from St. Fergus Moss, northeast of Aberdeen between the towns of Fraserburgh and Peterhead. It is one of the main mining areas for industrial malting plants in the Highlands. The peat from St. Fergus Moss is very dark, almost black. It comes from the northeast of Scotland and is characterized by a mild smoke structure. The supplier to most distilleries and malthouses is Scotland's largest licensed mining company, the Northern Peat Moss Company in Peterhead, Aberdeenshire.



" The wet peat comes from Bogbain Farm on the outskirts of Inverness."


Copyright Report Brian MacGregor
Copyright Report Brian MacGregor


It seems as if the Dross actually comes from Brian MacGregor & Sons Ltd. , whose business address is Bogbain Farm. The company is based at Bogbain Farm. They cut the peat with bagging machines, however, a few miles south of Inverness and not on the grounds of Bogbain Farm. The flat Moy Moss is very remote, south-east of Daviot - near the A9 and along the B9154 - and very close to the main Highland railway line, directly below the 511-metre-high Bein Breac. Loch Moy, to the south, is not far away.


The operator, Brian McGregor, cut peat moss under a temporary permit from 1982 to 1992 and then without any license until 2019. A subsequent permit from the Highland Council gave Brian MacGregor the right to cut peat in the Moy Moss in large quantities of 10,000 to 20,000 tonnes (maximum 100,000 tonnes in ten years) for a further ten years.


"Highland Council gave the go-ahead in November 2019 to a planning application for the removal of 10,000-20,000 tonnes of peat annually at Moy Moss, near Inverness....Brian MacGregor, the director of the family company carrying out the extraction, describing criticisms from environmental groups as misinformed. 'I supply the Scottish malt whisky industry and enough peat each week to grow 500 tonnes of UK mushrooms each week – there is no alternative substance that is available for both industries,' he said."

Source: The Ferret March 12, 2020


However, most of the Scottish peat has so far been used for horticulture, and some is still used to flavour malt whisky.


Peat Delivery


"This is something that surprisingly doesn’t happen as frequently as you may expect, generally only once (sometimes twice) per year in 28 ton batches."

Delivery at the beginning of February 2025.                                                               Photo Courtesy Springbank Distillery.
Delivery at the beginning of February 2025. Photo Courtesy Springbank Distillery.


At Springbank they use a cocktail of dry and wet peat for flavouring.



The peat is always prepared and fired at Springbank according to the same rules. They are not at random, as the stillmen always want to use the same 'smoky' quality in the peated malt. Their experienced maltmen colleagues ensure that the quality is always consistent. The firing in the furnace follows a recurring pattern: the bottom layer is covered with newspaper, then quickly burning dry logs, and the 'sausages' of dry brown St. Fergus peat are stacked on the 'slatted frame' above (see photo on the right). After about twenty minutes of firing, the damp black peat from Moy Moss is immediately added to the area using shovels, so that the resulting clouds of smoke collect under the kiln 'German Wire' floor in the clogie and diffuse evenly through the green, still damp malt. Again a mixture of dry peat and wet peat is continuously added. However, a warming fire is not desired, as the malt must ultimately retain its enzymes and enable the grain to absorb the phenols and cresols at large.




Photos Courtesy. Springbank Distillers.




Springbank. Peating. Floor. Peat. Furnace. Ventilation. Kiln Floor.




Inside the Kiln. Chimney, Kiln Wire Floor (seen from furnace and from top and underneath), Clogie, green malt for drying, furnace, ventilation. Distillery Manager Gavin McLachlan.




Literature


Andrew Jefford. Peat Smoke and Spirit. London, 2004.


Mike Billett. Peat and Whisky. The Unbreakable Bond. Glasgow, 2023.


 


Stroll around Springbank Distillery
at The Gateway to Distilleries
and enjoy lots of photos, please click photo:




 

About the author

Ernie - Ernst J. Scheiner is the editor of the portal The Gateway to Distilleries www.whisky-distilleries.net He photographically documents over 150 distilleries from the inside and describes the production of whiskies in detail. Since his studies at the University of Edinburgh he has been involved with the subject of whisky and has published in

specialist magazines

such as Ireland Journal, Kleinbrennerei, Whisky Passion and The Highland Herold . Features and stories appeared in the blogs whiskyexperts, whiskyfanblog and whiskyintelligence . As head of the VHS Ingelheim, and now as whisky ambassador, he leads distillation colleges, study trips and whisky culture tours to the sources of whisky.




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