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Success Discovered in Biofuel Testing
CANADA - Ontario Power Generation's coal-fired station in Atikokan is working towards becoming more environmentally friendly. “(OPG) has successfully demonstrated that the plant is capable of achieving design capacity using 100 per cent wood pellets and existing equipment,” station manager Ed Enge confirmed Friday.
The OPG plant has been test burning wood pellets since January and had just recently recorded the 100 per cent burn, reports The Chronicle Journal.
“Although these tests have been for brief durations of up to eight hours, encouraging results would suggest that longer sustainable runs could be accomplished with some improvements to fuel-receiving facilities and minor modifications to pulverizers and burners,” Enge said.
He explained that testing has progressed from a 15 per cent blend of biomass with coal in January; up to 100 per cent biomass in July. “Good equipment and eager well-trained staff have allowed us to accelerate the testing program,” he said, adding that additional tests will be conducted this fall and into 2009 to provide information on the effects of longer duration burns on plant equipment and to collect better information on emission characteristics.
The softwood pellets used in the testing are sawmill residue from British Columbian trees that have been ravaged by pine beetles.
The wood pellets have a higher heating value, lower moisture content and less ash than the low-sulfur Western Canadian lignite coal typically consumed by the station, Enge said, noting that boiler efficiency has remained about the same throughout the tests using pellets. As for problems encountered, Enge said the fuel receiving facility at the plant was not designed for efficient unloading of the enclosed grain cars delivering the wood pellets. Also, the pellets must be kept dry and indoor storage capacity is limited.
“These constraints pose some limitations on the amount of biomass fuel that can be handled at any time,” he said.
As for peat as a plant fuel, Aikokan GS plans to participate with the Atikokan Bioenergy Research Centre in a test burn sometime in 2009 with up to 500 tonnes of peat. Other than that, Enge said there are no plans to burn peat at the station.
OPG is supporting the bioenergy research, including a couple projects spearheaded by Lakehead University.
Biomass provides an opportunity to generate renewable energy from existing coal plants.
All four OPG coal plants, which are slated for closure by 2014, have biomass programs in place – doing the testing, research and cost estimating required to define a biomass option. In fact, the Thunder Bay Generating Station has conducted a test burn using pelletized grain screenings.
OPG says that co-firing with biomass is an option for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Biomass is considered to be “carbon neutral,” meaning the amount of carbon released when burned is equal to the amount removed from the atmosphere when trees or crops are being grown.
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