Energy efficiency competition progresses
4 Jun 2014
Three firms complete design stage in the Energy Technology Institute (ETI) £2.8m waste to energy competition.
The three firms competing in a £2.8 million competition to design and develop a waste to energy gasification system have all completed the design phase of project.
Advanced Plasma Power, Broadcrown and Royal Dahlman were each commissioned by the ETI to design and develop a plant to demonstrate an integrated waste to energy gasification system that would be commercial at between 5MW and 20MW.
We are delighted to have had three really strong designs for the first stage of our competition
ETI project manager Paul Winstanley
The designs were tested through a combination of laboratory and pilot-scale testing on different feedstocks and through underlying process modelling.
The gasification project is part of the ETI’s bioenergy programme, which is looking at the application of sustainable biomass and waste resources for flexible and affordable low carbon energy.
The expectation is that once constructed, the winning plant will initially operate as a demonstration site for up to three years.
After that, the plant will continue to operate as a commercial venture. The technical challenge is that the complete integrated system will need to operate with a net electrical efficiency of at least 25%, and an availability of at least 80%.
Paul Winstanley, ETI bioenergy project manager overseeing the competition, said: “We are delighted to have had three really strong designs for the first stage of our competition.
“Our request was to design an economically and commercially viable, efficient energy from waste gasification demonstrator plant, and each of these three companies demonstrated they could exceed our specifications on a variety of feedstocks.”
The consortium led by Advanced Plasma Power designed a demonstration facility with a net electrical output of 5MW, producing a clean syngas using its Gasplasma technology.
UK-based Broadcrown designed a demonstration facility with an electrical output of 3MW using a concept that promotes distributed waste management and power generation.
Meanwhile, Royal Dahlman led a team of British, Swiss, American and Dutch partners, to develop a plant with an electrical output of 7MW using MILENAOLGA technology, developed in cooperation with the Energy research Centre of the Netherlands (ECN). This will convert the waste into a clean syngas.
