Clean energy recovery from waste business ENERGOS says the government’s decision to reverse proposed changes to Renewables Obligation Certificate (ROC) support for Advanced Conversion Technologies (ACT) under its recent review will unlock much needed new generation infrastructure, including its own £450million investment pipeline, and has praised the Coalition for listening to industry.
“This is a victory for common sense”, said Nick Dawber, Managing Director of UK-based ENERGOS.
“By maintaining maximum support for all ACTs at 2 ROCs/MWh – both for new accreditations and existing schemes – the government will help innovative businesses like Energos to bring to market best in class technologies. This will create an important renewable energy source while diverting non-recyclable residual waste from landfill.
“The government has recognised that its comparisons of the efficiency of ACTs was not on a like-for- like basis and that steam cycle facilities, such as those developed by Energos, have merit. Indeed, the ROC market will itself drive efficiency upwards, which is what government seeks.”
ENERGOS opened the UK’s first full scale gasification ACT plant to operate on household waste on the Isle of Wight in 2007. This was the first waste fuelled gasification or pyrolysis plant operator in the UK to qualify for ROCs in October 2010.
The company is receiving maximum double ROCs for the electricity generated from the renewable portion of the residual household waste (typically around 50%).
Dawber added: “Today’s decision provides investment certainty and gives the green light to our six “shovel-ready” projects, valued at £450 million and capable of diverting 650,000 tonnes of non-recyclable waste from landfill. The government has also signalled that combined heat and power (CHP) enabled plants such as ours may be eligible for additional support under the Renewable Heat Incentive.”
The consultation proposed replacing the current calorific value (CV) based standard and advanced pyrolysis and gasification bands with two new ACT bands (‘standard ACT’ for steam-cycle technologies and ‘advanced ACT’ for internal combustion technologies). Standard ACTs would receive 0.5 ROCs/MWh for new accreditations and additional capacity added over the banding review period while advanced ACTs would receive 2 ROCs/MWh for new accreditations and additional capacity added between 1 April 2013 to 31 March 2015, falling to 1.9 ROCs/MWh for new accreditations and additional capacity added in 2015/16 and 1.8 ROCs/MWh in 2016/17. The consultation also proposed widening the range of fuels eligible for the ACT bands.
ENERGOS designs, builds, operates and maintains small-scale local facilities capable of converting non-recyclable residual waste into sustainable, low emission energy. The ENERGOS gasification technology can process waste and/or waste derived products. It produces low-cost heat and electricity, displacing fossil fuels while at the same time outperforming EU Emissions Standard (2000/76/EC).
ENERGOS has more than 500,000 hours of operating hours over more than 15 years at eight plants across Europe. Its patented gasification technology converts residual, non-recyclable waste into a gas by using the heat of partial combustion to free hydrogen and carbon in the waste.
Residual waste is fed into the gasification chamber, where it is converted into a syngas. This syngas is then transferred to a secondary oxidation chamber where it is mixed with air and recycled flue gas under tightly controlled conditions that ensures complete and efficient combustion resulting in reduced emissions in the flue gases. The upshot is ultra-low emissions, with the resulting heat recovered to produce steam and/or electricity.
A typical plant can generate 9MWe of renewable power from a variety of waste streams. This would equate to the output of 15 large wind turbines. ENERGOS facilities are designed to complement recycling initiatives, at a small scale model that can exist at the heart of the community. As such, facilities can be sited next to energy consumers to optimise heat recovery, or in locations where a heat delivery or district heating system could be developed. ENERGOS systems provide a local solution for local waste and eliminate the unnecessary transport of waste.
