Biogas news round-up
Monday 30 March 2009
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| Contamination removal systems at the new Budd Farm CHP plant |
Southern Water biogas plant turns CHP
A sewage sludge biogas plant at Southern Water's Budds Farm site in Hampshire has been converted to generate renewable electricity.
Slough-based Finning Power Systems fitted a combined heat and power system based on a Caterpillar G3520C generator, to produce 2MW of electrical power. The biogas produced by digestion tanks at the site was previously being used as a fuel to dry sewage sludge, but generating electricity will allow Southern Water to claim Renewables Obligation subsidies. Recovered heat will be used to keep the digesters at the optimum temperature.
Finning Power systems has agreed a 10-year operation and maintenance deal for the plant. Martin Ross, carbon policy manager with Southern Water, said: "Southern Water is using CHP technology from Finning across several of its sites. The solution delivered by Finning has proved extremely reliable."
AD firm calls for "balanced" feed-in tariffs
Anaerobic digestion company BiogenGreenfinch called for government to take a "balanced" approach to setting new feed-in tariffs for renewable electricity and heat.
The company that has biogas plants in Bedfordshire and Shropshire said it would be "madness" to set tariffs that encourage AD operators to use inefficient electricity generators and ignore potential for local heat use. Speaking at Thursday's REA tariffs conference in London, chief executive Dan Poulson also warned against encouraging the injection of biogas into the national gas pipelines if it meant local areas would not benefit from the heat potential.
Most importantly, the Biogen Greenfinch chief said new tariffs should be stable in the long-term and should be brought in quickly. Mr Poulson said: "We need tariffs and we need them soon. If you wait until April 2010 and 2011 we have lost up to 20% of the time to deliver these before the 2020 renewable energy target."
Consent for Dorset biogas plant
Eco's MD Trelawney Dampney
The company is to take about 25,000 tonnes of food waste from Dorset county council and about 12,000 tonnes of commercial organic waste each year from local businesses as a feedstock for the facility. Construction on the 2.5 acre site on the Bourne Park Industrial Estate is expected to begin in about a year, with the facility expected to be up and running in two years' time.
Trelawney Dampney, managing director of Parley-based Eco Sustainable Solutions, said: "We have to find an alternative fuel to oil. Generating energy from food waste is the most economically and environmentally sustainable way of doing it."
Biffa planning second anaerobic digestion plant
Waste management firm Biffa is hoping to build a 4MW anaerobic digestion facility at Cannock, Staffordshire.
It is developing a project that would use 80,000 tonnes of organic waste a year to generate renewable electricity and 2MW of heat. Biffa, which already runs a digestion facility at Wanlip in Leicestershire, is hoping the project will be operational by 2011.
Andre Horbach, Biffa chief executive, said: "This is a step towards achieving our stated ambition to develop Biffa's energy-from-waste activities. It will build on the novel and unique expertise that Biffa has through the development of the UK's first operational municipal solid waste AD plant in Leicester in 2003, which in itself generates 1.3MW annually."
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