Re: GAS-L: Irish gasification

["Colin Stucley" <enecon@ozemail.com.au>]

Dear Graeme,

A cold month in Ireland - you should have come to Western Australia earlier
in March for the IEA Task 17 meetings - we had 30 deg C and beautiful
sunshine!

Your comments on willow coppicing equipment are interesting, like others on
the network I would appreciate directions to more information.

We have recently had communications with B9 and would paint a brighter
picture than you have (mind you we have not stood in the cold looking at a
silent gasifier!).  B9 have replied to our specific requests for information
with polite words to the effect of "we are still working on this and want to
be completely comfortable with our results before we take this further ".
This is a refreshing and honest approach.  Unfortunately there are still
players around who make rash or naive promises about their technology, or
who have no idea of the technical and commercial gaps between a pilot
research rig and an operating commercial unit with performance guarantees.
Against the false expectations that such players develop I am grateful for a
bit of realism from people like B9.

Cheers from Australia,

Col Stucley
Enecon Pty Ltd


-----Original Message-----
From: Graeme Williams <graeme@powerlink.co.nz>
To: gasification@crest.org <gasification@crest.org>
Date: Wednesday, 22 March 2000 6:43 PM
Subject: GAS-L: Irish gasification


>Dear Gasification Colleagues
>
>Have just returned to New Zealand after a month in Ireland and the U.K. on
>what you could say was a busman's holiday.
>
>I attended the Energy from Wood Conference in Belfast 17-18 February, saw
>two gasified CHP  systems, one going, one not, coppice willow harvesting,
>storage, and drying, and a new gas turbine that looks made for producer
gas.
>So you could say that its all trying to happen in Northern Ireland.
>
>There are two companies currently showing gasifiers in Northern Ireland,
and
>I do believe a third company is laying low for the moment until their first
>project becomes public.
>
>Rural Generation Ltd has a demonstration project with a 100kWe CHP system,
>and a fuel drying and storage system to support their work using coppicing
>willow.  They also demonstrated a new willow harvesting machine which cut
10
>acres making a nice stack to conduct drying trials.
>
>On show but not connected was a small gas turbine developed for landfill
gas
>and able to run on 10% methane in that role.  You cannot see much of a
>turbine let alone question its suitability, so I later visited Queens
>University Belfast to exchange information regarding the interfacing of the
>two technologies.
>
>The RGL gasifier had computer monitoring and all the temperature profiles
>could be seen across the components.  Being a blown system, surplus gas was
>burnt in a flare stack, and gas to the engine had to pass through a
>regulator.  It was presented warts and all, but working and yes they did
>have sporadic tar problems, which I later sorted out as being a fuel
>problem.
>
>I should mention that I was in Ireland to protect the potential customers
of
>gasification by supervising fuel testing on their behalf using the RGL
>gasifier.  It has been discussed widely that gasifiers are fuel specific
and
>the ability to change or adapt the design quickly is an important detail
for
>commercial installations.  During the course of the fuel testing, the RGL
>team had an opportunity to learn more about packed char beds, and see for
>themselves how the fuel species and size affected gas making.  Although not
>planned, RGL have now sought a technical agreement to use Fluidyne
>technology to support their equipment development programme.
>
>Moving on to the other company demonstration, B9 Energy Ltd, the
>installation was promoted as the first zero condensate downdraught gasifier
>in the world.  Producing 80kWe using a CHP system, it had a computer
>controlled grab crane to load chips into a fuel drier then through fuel
lock
>into the gasifier. The installation stood cold and silent (like we were)
and
>no information was offered on performance etc.  Specific questions like
>"whats that" were declined to be answered, so if Hub Stassen from BTG in
the
>Netherlands  been present, I at least could theorise with someone else who
>knew what we should be seeing.
>
>There is a limit to what may be considered classified information, but when
>you sell equipment and others rely on the function of that technology, as a
>manufacturer, everything has to be available for public scrutiny.  In my
>opinion B9 Energy lost a golden opportunity to how their stuff, but maybe
>like RGL had been having bad fuel days, for it was easy to see their chip
>fuel as nothing less than very poor quality,.
>For the moment, hope this report will get your interest away from steam and
>turbines that work on the etherical level, and will post some separate
>reports and photographs over the next few weeks as time becomes available.
>
>Regards
>Doug Williams
>Fluidyne.
>
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