Devon County Council has conditionally approved a planning application submitted by Viridor for a CHP plant at Exeter. Conditions include a requirement to undertake works to reduce the risk of potential flooding at the site and surrounding area.
The plant will be constructed on the Marsh Barton Industrial Estate on the area formerly occupied by the old Exeter incinerator which was decommissioned in 1996.
Artists impression of the propose efw-chp facility at Exeter (Photo - Viridor)
The new facility will treat a proportion of Exeter and Devon’s municipal waste while generating electricity and usable heat for the benefit of local business and industry, helping to replace fossil fuel use and improve energy efficiency.
The plant will have a handling capacity of up to 60,000 tonnes and will use technology that has been successfully employed elsewhere in the UK and across Europe and the USA.
The efw-chp facility
The new plant will use oscillating kiln technology which has been proven elsewhere but especially at the Newlincs plant near Grimsby. The Newlincs site is also constructed on a relatively small scale suitable for rural locations and waste quantities.
The new facility should have significant environmental benefits over similar technologies in that as well as producing electrical energy for feeding into the national grid, its efficiency will be increased due to the export of surplus heat produced to local users located nearby.
The facility would work alongside Devon’s recycling programmes and would not prevent the development of future recycling initiatives. The intention of Viridor is to use waste residues that cannot realistically be recycled for the foreseeable future.
At 60,000 tonnes capacity the proposed plant would be a relatively small efw unit. It would operate 24 hours per day and would employ 20 people.
Construction of the new facility should begin in 2008 with operation commencement by 2010.
The Newlinks site near Grimsby also uses oscillating kiln technology
Local use of heat
Use of the heat produced increases overall thermal efficiency and displaces fossil fuels (such as gas and oil) that would otherwise be used. Viridor says that this will provide renewable energy at a steady price protected from the volatility of the prices of fossil fuels.
Because of the need for pipework runs, potential users of the heat need to be in a reasonable proximity to the plant. The Marsh Barton Estate offers the possibility of providing a number of potential consumers.
Viridor is to hold further discussions with potential customers and intends enter into commercial and technical agreements with local energy consumers.
One possibility is a nearby rendering plant which is a strategically important business which needs reliable and economic energy provision.
Another possibility is a metal finishing company which requires heat to operate its plating process. The company currently obtains its heat from natural gas and utilising heat from the EfW plant would improve thermal efficiency and reduce the plating plant’s carbon footprint.
Carbon footprint
Viridor says that the CHP plant, “can be shown to have an annual CO2 credit of over 22,000 tonnes (CO2 equivalent) per annum when both power and heat are utilised”. The company indicates that assuming an optimum solution with low grade heat take up, gives the following emissions in tonnes of CO2 p.a:
Transport + 476
Process (incineration) + 14,084
Avoided (benefit of heat and power) - 37,065
Total - 22,496