On Wednesday evening, Revenue officers, assisted by the Garda Armed Support Unit from Dundalk, carried out a search under warrant of a premises and farm buildings in Co Louth where they found a large-scale plant, set up to process denatured industrial alcohol.

The plant was arranged in a production line system and Revenue officers seized 586 litres of finished ‘vodka-type’ product.

It was bottled, sealed, labelled and boxed, along with 4,000 litres of the raw alcohol product, which would produce in the region of 12,000 litres of ‘vodka-type’ spirits.

Revenue seized all the production line apparatus, mixing tank and containers, along with packaging, bottle caps and labels which were all counterfeit.

A forklift truck and cash amounts of €5,000 and £1,000 were also seized.

The potential retail value of the alcohol is approximately €460,000, representing a potential loss to the Exchequer of approximately €300,000.

A man was interviewed and investigations are ongoing with a view to prosecution.

Revenue would like to remind anyone tempted to buy cheap alcohol, tobacco or consumer goods from an irregular source of supply that there is a high possibility that they are buying counterfeit goods.

Publicans and consumers should only purchase alcohol from reputable sources of supply, the Revenue advises.

Vodka is the most commonly counterfeited alcohol and often contains high quantities of methanol, a poisonous chemical that can cause breathing difficulties, liver damage or blindness; and isopropyl alcohol, a chemical solvent commonly found in nail varnish remover.

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