Air Force base to gasify waste for energy

Gasification is coming to the United States:

There are just too many projects being proposed, for it not to be implemented in several locations.

Here's another W2E gasification project being evaluated.

Gasification makes so much more sense than incineration.

Momentum, Momentum, Momentum

BioMass has hit an inflection point. Marketshares will be established quickly. US MicroGrid is busy advising clients on the underlying economics and working to drive adoption of this carbon advantaged solution.

Recent Announcements include:

Ohio:

First Energy is retrofitting Berger 3, and 4: A total of 312 MW! I sure hope they have done there homework on feedstock transportation.

Florida:

Gainsville Regional Utilities (GRU) has announced a deal for a 100 MW Plant.

Duke Energy has announced (through affiliate ADAGE) a 50 MW plant for Hamilton County.

BG&E has announced a 42 MW plant in Northwest Florida

Georgia:

Oglethorpe has closed on a parcel of land in Warren County as the site for their first 100 MW plant.

Wisconsin:

WE Energies has announced a 50 MW cogen plant for 250 Million. That's $ 5,000 per kw folks --hopefully theres a bit more than a cogen plant in that number!

New Hampshire:

Chocolate manufacturer Lindt is conducting co-firing tests with cocoa shells with the New Hampshire Public Service Commission. The US is way behind Europe in co-firing, although severla utilities are testing it.

In the next 5 years, we estimate an additional 4,000 MW of biomass power will be comissioned, which when added to wind and solar could really get us to 10% renewable. That's a start.

Middlebury's Intelligent Carbon Strategy

Middlebury college is on a march towards economically viable, carbon neutrality by 2016.

A biomass fueled district heating and cooling system is the cornerstone of this movement.

Middlebury is ahead of the pack in other ways as well -- they are focused on feedstock availability so that they don't create the "ethanol effect" -- where the popularity of a technology ends up driving up feedstock prices to the point where it kills the economics. Middlebury is working with SUNY, who is working on short rotation willow.  We think willow is not getting the attention it should in the feedstock area, being incorrectly eclipsed by switchgrass.  

But the other feedstock that shows real promise is processed waste streams.  (more on this in another post).  Here's the key:  Multiple feedstock streams are a stategic way to build a competitive fuel strategy that ensures a cost competitive carbon neutral strategy.

US MicroGrid Announces The BioMass Evaluator

Responding to the growing interest in biomass, US MicroGrid has launched a free service for customers considering a biomass project.

Biomass combustion is an excellent, near term renewable strategy that is economically viable even without subdies when applied to the right application. 

However, we have been fielding a lot of requests for information, evaluation and business models and unfortunatley not all situations are created equal. 

To help the industry develop, we created the Biomass Evaluator. Prospective customers provide us with certain imput data and we run that data through scoring programs.  The prospective customer gets a BioMass Project Score, which relates their project to other projects in our growing database and provides them with a short report on the virtues (or potential hurdles) they might have in achieving project profitability.

According to Van Morris, President of US MicroGrid "part of  our near term contribution may be to make sure that the right projects get attention and funding support, while helping companies avoid time on less promising projects"   Click here and put the word "EVALUATOR" in the comment box if you would like a free evaluation.

How to Get Started Evaluating a Biomass Project

Biomass has entered the 'viability zone'. In the right applications, it is an economically viable renewable energy source. Furthermore, it can provide a wonderful hedge against future hydrocarbon price increases and will most likely benefit from carbon legislation.

So is it right for you? To help you find out, we've created a white paper entitled "5 Things to Consider when Evaluating a Biomass Project". Feel free to get a copy here.

We're helping several customers evaluate biomass projects right now, and will keep you updated on the progress.