£50 million contract to operate Sherwood Biomass Plant in Nottingham
Veolia have further strengthened their position in generating energy from biomass by securing a £50 million contract from Equitix ESI CHP, to operate the Sherwood Biomass Plant in Nottingham. The 20 year contract highlights the growing UK commitment to this type of energy project, and adds to the £500 million of biomass energy managed by Veolia in the UK and Ireland.
Located in Widmerpool, Nottingham the 6.55MWe biomass-fired combined heat and power station is designed to provide sustainable green electricity for over 10,000 homes and supply up to 4.5MWth of process heat for the adjacent sawmill operations. The new plant will recycle around 52,000 tonnes of waste wood as a carbon neutral fuel and will annually save around 8,400 tonnes of CO2 emissions.
Under the contract, Veolia will provide operation and maintenance on a 24/7 basis and will deliver monitoring, reporting and compliance services. The agreement also covers water treatment, emission monitoring, and ash disposal for the new plant that is due to start generating renewable electricity and heat in spring 2017.
Estelle Brachlianoff, Senior Executive Vice President, Veolia UK and Ireland, said “This new contract highlights our renewable energy expertise and will recycle waste biomass to produce green energy for the grid. Ahead of COP21 this demonstrates our on-going commitment to cut carbon emissions for industry and communities, and sustainably recycles biomass that would otherwise be wasted”.
The Sherwood plant will use a traditional steam cycle for generating electricity though the combustion of life expired wastewood from local sources. The contract follows Veolia’s recent appointment to operate the Holbrook Community Energy Centre in Sheffield and means that the resource management company has extended its biomass energy operations by 55MWe this year alone. In the UK Veolia’s renewable biomass energy operations have saved over 500,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions in the last four years.