Tuesday 9 April 2013

Three firms battle for super efficient waste-to-energy plant

Three firms battle for super efficient waste-to-energy plant

Three companies have been shortlisted to design the most economically and commercially viable waste-to-energy gasification demonstrator plant.

The Energy Technologies Institute’s (ETI) £2.8m project will see Advanced Plasma Power (APP), Broadcrown Ltd and Royal Dahlman compete to develop the plant that would be commercial at between 5MW-20MW.

The chosen plant could be designed, built, tested and in operation by 2016 and is expected to operate as a demonstration site for up to four years.

The ETI commissioned the project with the aim of showing that energy from waste plant could create power at higher efficiencies than those previously produced in the industry, with the goal of operating the plant at an efficiency rate of at least 25%.

Paul Winstanley, the ETI Bioenergy Project Manager overseeing the competition said: “Our national modelling work shows that bioenergy could be a key component of any future energy systems mix to meet the demands of providing affordable, secure and sustainable energy. We have already completed an extensive analysis of the existing energy from waste technologies currently available, as well as the breakdown and quantities of typical UK municipal, commercial and industrial waste.

“Any successful design of such a plant will provide the opportunity to move towards more efficient, distributed energy conversion technologies and reduce dependency on landfill for waste management in the UK.”

APP is designing a demonstation facility with an output of 6MWe while Broadcrown is designing a highly scaleable 2MW facility. Royal Dahlman is creating the largest generator with an output of 7MWe.

The ETI is a public-private partnership between the UK Government and global companies – BP, Caterpillar, EDF, E.ON, Rolls-Royce and Shell.

Written by

Bruna Pinhoni

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