Sacramento utility in 10 year contract to purchase competitive biomass energy
The Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) Board of Directors announces it has approved the extension of an 18-month contract with Sierra Pacific Industries (SPI) for the purchase of carbon-neutral renewable energy from a new biomass plant in Burlington, WA.
The agreement will allow SMUD to buy 15 to 23 megawatts of round-the-clock baseload power at a competitive cost relative to other renewables like wind or solar, through July 31, 2017. This is enough electricity to serve between 13,000 and 20,000 homes.
Biomass power plants have advantages over wind and solar energy, in that the latter are intermittent energy sources, not capable of generating electricity when there's no wind or sunshine. They need baseload back-up from another source (mostly fossil fuels). Biomass on the contrary is an energy carrier and can be stored, traded, and utilized to provide a reliable baseload. With biomass, peaks in demand can easily be met. However, the difference should not be exaggerated as distributed wind and solar systems are being developed and new energy storage concepts are emerging.
What really sets biomass apart from other renewables is the fact that the energy carrier can be utilized in power stations and fuel production factilities that are coupled to carbon capture and storage systems. This allows for the production of radically carbon-negative energy which takes historic CO2 emissions out of the atmosphere. Such a concept is possible only with biomass; all other renewables are carbon-neutral at best.
Sierra Pacific Industries - a forestry company - turns wood waste into energy through seven cogeneration plants. Together, these facilities produce over 100 megawatts of electrical power. Bark, sawdust, and other low-grade byproducts of wood manufacturing processes were burned or sent to landfills in the past. Today, Sierra Pacific Industries turns these materials into biofuels for on-site cogeneration facilities and dedicated biomass power plants:
energy :: sustainability :: renewables :: bioenergy :: biofuels :: forestry :: wood :: biomass :: efficiency :: baseload ::
Besides the bioenergy purchase agreement, SMUD Board also approved a 10-year extension of a related transmission and exchange agreement with Seattle City Light. This agreement brings SMUD closer to its goal of getting 20 percent of its power supply from renewable energy sources by 2011. In 2006, SMUD’s power mix was made up of over 13 percent qualifying renewable sources.
Through its Greenergy program, SMUD offers consumers the choice of supporting energy created by green resources. Greenergy members can switch to 100 percent renewable resources for use on the SMUD power system for only pennies a day.
Renewable resources (like bioenergy and landfill gas created by waste decomposition) are used to create the energy for Greenergy, not conventional sources that pollute like coal. SMUD matches 40 percent of the Greenergy premium to help secure new power plants fueled by renewable resources.
More than 30,000 customers have signed up for SMUD's Greenergy. According to the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL), Greenergy qualifies as America's fifth-largest green pricing program based on the number of customers enrolled.
In addition to purchases of renewable power based on biomass, SMUD owns approximately 39 megawatts of wind generation (with an additional 63 megawatts on-line by year’s end) and 10.4 megawatts of solar power.
References:
Sacramento Municipal Utility District: SMUD Board approves 10-year wood biomass purchase [*.pdf] - September 24, 2007.
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The agreement will allow SMUD to buy 15 to 23 megawatts of round-the-clock baseload power at a competitive cost relative to other renewables like wind or solar, through July 31, 2017. This is enough electricity to serve between 13,000 and 20,000 homes.
Biomass power plants have advantages over wind and solar energy, in that the latter are intermittent energy sources, not capable of generating electricity when there's no wind or sunshine. They need baseload back-up from another source (mostly fossil fuels). Biomass on the contrary is an energy carrier and can be stored, traded, and utilized to provide a reliable baseload. With biomass, peaks in demand can easily be met. However, the difference should not be exaggerated as distributed wind and solar systems are being developed and new energy storage concepts are emerging.
What really sets biomass apart from other renewables is the fact that the energy carrier can be utilized in power stations and fuel production factilities that are coupled to carbon capture and storage systems. This allows for the production of radically carbon-negative energy which takes historic CO2 emissions out of the atmosphere. Such a concept is possible only with biomass; all other renewables are carbon-neutral at best.
Sierra Pacific Industries - a forestry company - turns wood waste into energy through seven cogeneration plants. Together, these facilities produce over 100 megawatts of electrical power. Bark, sawdust, and other low-grade byproducts of wood manufacturing processes were burned or sent to landfills in the past. Today, Sierra Pacific Industries turns these materials into biofuels for on-site cogeneration facilities and dedicated biomass power plants:
energy :: sustainability :: renewables :: bioenergy :: biofuels :: forestry :: wood :: biomass :: efficiency :: baseload ::
Besides the bioenergy purchase agreement, SMUD Board also approved a 10-year extension of a related transmission and exchange agreement with Seattle City Light. This agreement brings SMUD closer to its goal of getting 20 percent of its power supply from renewable energy sources by 2011. In 2006, SMUD’s power mix was made up of over 13 percent qualifying renewable sources.
Through its Greenergy program, SMUD offers consumers the choice of supporting energy created by green resources. Greenergy members can switch to 100 percent renewable resources for use on the SMUD power system for only pennies a day.
Renewable resources (like bioenergy and landfill gas created by waste decomposition) are used to create the energy for Greenergy, not conventional sources that pollute like coal. SMUD matches 40 percent of the Greenergy premium to help secure new power plants fueled by renewable resources.
More than 30,000 customers have signed up for SMUD's Greenergy. According to the National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL), Greenergy qualifies as America's fifth-largest green pricing program based on the number of customers enrolled.
In addition to purchases of renewable power based on biomass, SMUD owns approximately 39 megawatts of wind generation (with an additional 63 megawatts on-line by year’s end) and 10.4 megawatts of solar power.
References:
Sacramento Municipal Utility District: SMUD Board approves 10-year wood biomass purchase [*.pdf] - September 24, 2007.
Article continues
Friday, September 28, 2007
RWE Power, BASF and Linde to cooperate on CO2 capture technology
The development of carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies - which promise to reduce carbon emissions from coal plants by up to 90% - is important to the bioenergy community in that they can be applied to biomass fuels, thus opening the prospect of radically carbon-negative energy production. Such 'bio-energy with carbon storage' (BECS) systems are seen as the most realistic energy systems to reduce greenhouse gas emissions on a global and drastic scale (earlier post and here). Scientists have studied the concept in the context of 'abrupt climate change' scenarios, and found the technology - if implemented worldwide which would require the establishment of vast energy plantations - can be seen as the most cost-effective, safe and viable 'geo-engineering' option (more here).
BECS-systems take historic CO2 emissions out of the atmosphere; if implemented globally, they could take us back to pre-industrial CO2 levels by mid-century. Only biomass combined with CCS can yield carbon-negative energy and fuels; all other renewables are carbon-neutral at best and merely prevent new emissions. BECS systems clean up our past.
The fossil fuels industry will develop CCS technologies first because it has the money and means to do so, after which they should be applied to biofuels as soon as possible.
Pilot plant
The purpose of the pilot facility to be run by RWE Power is the long-term testing of new solvents with a view to gaining an understanding of processes and plant engineering to improve CO2 capture technology. The goal is to apply CO2 capture commercially in lignite-fired power plants by 2020. The new technology should enable to removal of more than 90 per cent of CO2 from the combustion gas of a power plant and then subsequently to store this gas underground.
Once pilot tests have been completed successfully, the companies will decide on a subsequent demonstration plant in 2010. This will be designed to provide a reliable basis for the commercialisation of the new process. RWE Power has earmarked a budget of approximately €80 million for the development project, including the construction and operation of the pilot facility and demonstration plant.
RWE Power, Germany's largest energy company, is designing all its new coal-fired power plants so that they can eventually be equipped with the CO2 capture technology that is currently being developed with BASF and Linde. The aim is to set up not only highly modern plants from 2020 onwards, but also virtually carbon-neutral coal-fired power plants including storage.
Apart from the so-called CO2-scrubbing method, RWE Power is also developing the first carbon-neutral coal-fired power plant with CO2 transport and storage, based on the integrated gasification combined-cycle process (IGCC). This large-scale 450-MW plant is due to come on stream in 2014, although no decision has yet been taken as to where it should be located. With a view to climate protection, RWE Power has also decided to expand renewable energies throughout Europe, with the focus on generating electric power from water, wind and biomass.
CASTOR: European carbon capture project
RWE and BASF have been involved in the CASTOR project since early 2004, a research project that is sponsored by the European Union (EU) and which seeks to find methods to remove CO2 from combustion gases and to store it:
energy :: sustainability :: ethanol :: biomass :: bioenergy :: biofuels :: carbon capture and storage :: bio-energy with carbon storage :: climate change ::
The project is also supported by a number of prestigious European universities, research institutions, public authorities and industrial enterprises, including several renowned power plant operators, oil and gas companies and plant manufacturers.
According to Lambertz there is agreement among experts that coal will continue to be an important pillar in the global energy supply for decades to come. This is why the companies have set up a long-range CO2 avoidance strategy: building the most efficient coal-fired power plants in the world, and developing a new generation of power plants for tomorrow, with an efficiency of over 50 per cent.
RWE Power is the largest German electricity producer responsible for the Group's generation of electric power in Germany as well as in Central/Eastern Europe. RWE Power uses a wide range of energy sources: lignite from open-cast mines in the Rhineland and nuclear energy for the base load, as well as hard coal, gas and renewable energies such as water, wind and biomass for medium and peak loads. RWE Power and its subsidiaries employ a workforce of over 17,000, both in Germany and abroad.
BASF is the world's leading chemical company. Its portfolio ranges from chemicals, plastics, performance products, agricultural products and fine chemicals to crude oil and natural gas. As a reliable partner to virtually all industries, BASF's high-value products and intelligent system solutions help its customers to be more successful. BASF develops new technologies and uses them to meet the challenges of the future and open up additional market opportunities.
The Linde Group is a leading gases and engineering company with around 49,000 employees working in more than 70 countries worldwide. Following the acquisition of The BOC Group plc, the company has sales of around 12 billion euro per annum.
Image: RWE Power AG's brown-coal fired power plant in Niederaussem, which will run the trials with BASF's carbon capturing solvents. Credit: RWE Power.
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posted by Biopact team at 8:34 PM 0 comments links to this post