Beefing up biomass

Wood-fired plant to deliver energy by 2011

Waste timber, sawdust, or even willow, are set to power more and more of our homes. By 2011, electricity from a new biomass power station in Lincolnshire will be part of the electricity mix in the national grid, produced from waste wood from timber processing, along with specially grown crops such as willow.

Helius Energy’s Stallingborough plant, in the Humber Estuary, will burn 430,000 tonnes of biomass a year to produce 65MW, enough renewable electricity for about 100,000 homes. It’s one of several such plants currently planned for the next few years in the UK, including Blackburn Meadows, near Sheffield (25MW) Bristol (150W) and Port Talbot (350MW).

Biomass currently provides about a two-thirds of the UK’s renewable electricity generation (or 2.3% of total electricity generation) and a small slice of the country’s heat generation (0.6%). But The Department for Business, Enterprise & Regulatory Reform has higher hopes for it – looking to boost its share of electricity and heat generation to 4.5% by 2020, and to 6% by 2050. Wood, food waste and garden waste are all on the list for potential feedstocks.

Anne Wheldon, renewable energy expert and technical director for the Ashden Awards for Sustainable Energy, says the Stallingborough station offers the chance for “valuable working experience of plants at this scale”. She’s also keen on the possibility that it could capture heat, as a combined heat and power system is a much more efficient use of biomass. The fact that the plant is burning waste wood as opposed to virgin crops also makes better sense than using valuable agricultural land to grow energy crops, she adds – especially in the midst of a global food shortage. – Susan Gransden and Hannah Bullock 

7 August 2008

Susan Gransden