Generating electricity from waste wood

[WFWales]

I've had an enquiry from a someone with an abundant supply of waste pallets.

 

Their company uses 25,000 units of electricty a month.

 

They would like to burn the pallets to create heat and electricity.

 

Can anyone help point me towards biomass chp equipment that will fit the bill please?

 

any real life small scale biomass chp background would be interesting and some help with the maths of sizing such a unit would be helpfull too! I guess divide 25k by 30 to give a daily rate then divide again by 24 for hourly rate (if 24 hour operation) = rating for E production?

 

Cheers -M

[renewablejohn]

What is there budget??? If the pallets are not Virgin timber then it will need to be a WID compliant plant which doubles the price straight away.

 

PM me if you have any queries.

[PhilBeech]

As above plus they will need shredding not chipping over a magnetic conveyor to pull out the nails etc.

[openspaceman]

I've had an enquiry from a someone with an abundant supply of waste pallets.

 

"Waste" being an operative word in this context. At best you may claim the wood to be clean untreated biomass ( no paint or chipboard glue?). The leglislation will have bearing on the size of plant.

 

 

Their company uses 25,000 units of electricty a month.

 

They would like to burn the pallets to create heat and electricity.

 

Can anyone help point me towards biomass chp equipment that will fit the bill please?

 

 

15 years ago I would have looked to the Hurst boiler company in america, I'm way out of touch now. Then it was reckoned the smallest viable plant with a steam turbine was 3MW and cost millions. This is about 30 times more than your need. Most CHP plant need to run 8000 hours a year to be cost effective.

 

There are numerous small scale attempts of doing this by gasification, have a look at GEK from California for a cheap learning unit. Any other gasifiers I'm aware of outside the third world haven't stayed in commission long. Variious reasons often to do with pollution and low engine life. If I had to do it I'd probably use high temperature charcoal if the feedstock were free.

 

The most recent costly project that wasn't quite working was the one at the University of East Anglia.

 

Other possible routes to electricity from wood are direct combustion gas turbines, that worked quite well but relatively low conversion efficiency. Indirect heated GT, Talbott built some but major problems with heat exchangers. Solid oxide fuel cells, been just 2 years from launch by Siemens and Rolls Royce for 10 years now and simple semiconductor thermopiles as used in space craft and russian army, high cost and low conversion, Caterpillar got one working at 5kW on a large truck exhaust.

[WFWales]

Thanks Guys - I'll pass this info on.

 

M

[TimberCutterDartmoor]

Would this be O-Gen?!

 

PM if neccessary...

[WFWales]

Would this be O-Gen?!

 

PM if neccessary...

 

?? - sorry if i'm being thick......