Rookery South Limited have awarded the contract to construct England’s latest EfW plant to the Swiss company Hitachi Zosen Inova, building on successful collaboration forged in earlier projects. In the future, the Rookery South plant will process 545,000 metric tons of solid municipal and commercial waste a year to generate more than 60 MW of electricity for the national grid.

The signing of the contract on 21 March 2019 signals the next step in the construction of a new Energy from Waste (EfW) plant in Bedfordshire around 100 kilometers north of London. The Rookery South Limited operating company, jointly owned by Covanta, Green Investment Group and Veolia, has granted the contract to Swiss cleantech company Hitachi Zosen Inova (HZI), building on a partnership going back to earlier joint projects. HZI and Veolia can look back on the successful delivery of the Newhaven project in 2011, while HZI built the Poolbeg plant in Dublin, which went into operation in 2017, on behalf of Covanta.

“We are pleased to continue our partnership with Hitachi Zosen Inova for the construction of the Rookery South Energy Recovery Facility,” said Covanta Senior Vice President of Engineering and Projects Anne Michelini. “Following our recent success in Dublin, Ireland where we partnered to build a world-class Energy from Waste facility, I’m confident of our ability to achieve similar results with the Rookery project.”

Important Contribution to UK’s Waste Management Efforts
Rookery South is already the Swiss company’s eleventh project in the UK. With an overall waste throughput of up to over 3.9 million metric tons a year in the future, HZI’s EfW installations are already crucial to the UK’s sustainable waste management efforts. “Over more than a decade, the UK has become a particularly important market for HZI with an awarded waste capacity of almost the total capacity of smaller European countries such as Switzerland”, says Andres Kronenberg, Chief Business Development Officer at HZI.

With three combustion lines processing around 545,000 metric tons (585,000 t max.) of mixed municipal and commercial waste annually, the Rookery plant will play an active part in the UK’s endeavors to reduce or eliminate the need for landfill and exports of refuse and, will therefore play a role in reducing of the UK’s greenhouse gas emissions. During the process the installation will also generate more than 60 MW of electricity energy, which will be fed into the national grid to increase the benefits to society even further.

“The Rookery project adds major value for all concerned. It’s a boon not only for the UK’s waste management and energy, but also for us as a general contractor, as it underlines the trust, our clients and partners have in HZI”, says Andres Kronenberg, emphasising the relevance of this latest project.

Work Already in Full Swing
The scope of supply for the turnkey plant also covers the entire building construction. The first engineering tasks, and initial work on the site, are already in full swing. For example, preliminary work such as the construction of a pond to prevent flooding was initiated several months ago. Access roads are already open, and additional planning work to ensure safety and efficiency has been done to enable construction to begin as soon as the contract is signed.

The local economy will also benefit: over the next 39 months several hundred people will be working on the plant simultaneously at peak periods. Efforts to hire local people for various phases of the construction are also at an advanced stage. When the plant will go into operation in 2022 another ca. 60 long-term jobs are planned to operate and maintain the installation.

© Picture: Lounavoima Oy

Steinmüller Babcock Environment GmbH, based in Gummersbach/Germany, has been awarded the contract for the extended boiler lot of the Salo Waste-to-Energy plant in southwestern Finland. The scope of supply and services includes the planning, delivery, installation and commissioning of the boiler system including grate firing, turbine, electrical and control technology as well as the boiler house.

The contractor is the project company Lounavoima Oy, which was founded especially for the construction and operation of the plant by the municipal waste management company Lounais-Suomen Jätehuolto Oy and the municipal district heating company Salon Kaukolämpö Oy. Commissioning of the plant is planned for the end of 2020.

In the single-line plant, up to 120,000 t of municipal and commercial waste from the cities of Turku and Salo will be thermally recycled each year. After commissioning, the plant generates 180 - 190 GWh of heat, which are fed into the local district heating network. This corresponds to 90 % of the total district heating required in the city of Salo. Likewise, 72 GWh of electricity are fed into the public grid every year.

Here you can find further information on Steinmüller Babcock: www.steinmueller-babcock.com.

MARTIN's licensee in China, Sanfeng Covanta Environmental Industry Co., Ltd, has been awarded 12 new projects with MARTIN reverse-acting grate SITY2000 technology. 11 in China, 1 in Thailand. The total 18 combustion lines have a capacity of 10,750 ton per day.

Babcock & Wilcox Enterprises, Inc. announced that its Denmark-based subsidiary, Babcock & Wilcox Vølund, and its project partner, Interserve, have successfully turned over a renewable energy plant project near Dunbar, East Lothain, Scotland, to the customer, Viridor.

The Dunbar Energy Recovery Facility, a municipal waste-to-energy plant, will provide green power for 39,000 homes while providing more than 50 permanent, full-time jobs for the community. B&W Vølund’s advanced waste combustion technology also will help the community dramatically reduce its reliance on landfilling by processing 320,000 tonnes of municipal and construction waste annually that would otherwise end up in a landfill.

This project is one of four European renewable energy projects B&W previously announced it expects to turn over to customers in the first and second quarters of 2019. The Dunbar project was referred to as the “sixth project” in B&W’s previous public disclosures about its European Renewable projects.

“B&W’s Vølund’s advanced technology is proven and reliable for waste-to-energy customers worldwide and we’re proud to have executed this important project for Viridor,” said B&W Chief Executive Officer Kenneth Young. “The Dunbar facility, which features B&W Vølund’s state-of-the-art DynaGrate® fuel combustion system, will be able to process up to 38 tons of municipal waste per hour, deliver power to thousands of local homes and businesses, and help the Scottish government meet its target of landfilling zero biodegradable municipal waste by 2021.”

“Successful turnover of this project was an important step forward for B&W and reflects the hard work and strong dedication of our project team and highly skilled employees,” Young said. “We remain focused on completing our remaining European projects while we streamline overall operations, reducing overhead costs and enhancing the strength of our core technologies and services that establish B&W and its brands as a true global leader.”

The plant features two B&W Vølund boilers and the advanced DynaGrate dynamic fuel combustion system, steam turbine and B&W emissions control equipment. B&W Vølund’s DynaGrate is one of the most-reliable combustion grates on the market and is tailored to the waste-to-energy and biomass energy industries. It provides excellent performance with low maintenance costs due to a design technology that reduces wear and tear on components.

Compared to other grate technologies, the DynaGrate combustion technology also produces significantly less fly ash, reducing the generation of secondary waste to landfill while allowing for recovery and recycling of all ferrous metals from the bottom ash.

Over the past 80 years, B&W Vølund has supplied more than 500 combustion grates worldwide.

About B&W
Babcock & Wilcox is a global leader in energy and environmental technologies and services for the power and industrial markets, and has been transforming our world for 151 years. Follow us on Twitter @BabcockWilcox and learn more at www.babcock.com.