Designing a Distillery Waste-
Disposal Plant
Alex B. Davidson, Engineer
Schenley Distillers, Inc.
Cincinnati, Ohio
The Monticello Distillery at Cedarhurst, Maryland, is on the
North Branch of the Patapsco River and has been in this location
for many years. The stream has a sizable flow both winter and sum¬
mer and is relatively unpolluted by industrial or municipal wastes.
In fact, it was in such condition that the city of Baltimore decided
on it as an additional source of water supply several years ago. The
city plans to utilize the flowing stream directly by means of a tunnel,
at the beginning of its water works expansion program and eventually
(inside of ten years) to construct a dam to obtain additional storage.
The requirements of the city and more stringent regulations by the
water-pollution control authorities of the state require much higher
purification of any wastes entering the stream than previously. The
Monticello Distillery has been equipped with a complete dry-house
recovery system for some years so that more than 98 percent of the pollu¬
tional material in its wastes was recovered. However, the proposed
usage of the stream and the new regulations indicated that further
purification would be necessary. In discussions and consultations with
the Maryland State Health Department several requirements were
brought out, namely, that the effluent to the stream should have a
BOD of less than 50 ppm in summer and 75 ppm in winter with very
little suspended solids, no toxicity, a reasonably neutral pH, and no
oil or other deleterious materials.
Description of Plant and Process
The Monticello installation is a standard-type distillery equipped
to process corn or rye so as to make either bourbon or rye whiskey. In
the distilling process the raw grains and malt are ground, mixed with
water, and cooked, to form a mash, which is then converted to beer by
the action of yeast. This beer is then distilled to supply the finished
whiskey, the spent mash from the beer still being the major pollutional
waste.  The spent mash, having a BOD of approximately 40,000 ppm,
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