DISTRICT HEATING INDUSTRY NEWS


Flue gas heat recovery at Rovaniemen Energia


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aluable energy is no longer breaking free into thin air at the Suosiola combined


heat and power plant located in Rovaniemi, which is known as the


capital of Finnish Lapland and the offi cial hometown of Santa Claus. Operated by Rovaniemen Energia Oy, the plant recently started up a fl ue gas cleaning system with heat recovery supplied by Valmet.


“Over the fi rst few months, we have gained positive experiences with fl ue gas heat recovery: up to 22 MW more district heat production capacity in trial runs; 95% reduction in SO2 emissions;


and 75% reduction in dust emissions,” said Jukka Partanen, Production Director, Rovaniemen Energia. “The scrubber capacity naturally depends on the boiler’s fl ue gas fl ow and moisture, as


Curing concerns about district heating


One of bioenergy’s big problems is consumers’ suspicion of large- scale solutions where everyone is attached to the same system. During the World Bioenergy 2014 conference at Elmia in June, Jonas Cognell presented an on-going EU project, Celsius – Smart Cities, which aims to cure this apprehension.


Cognell represents one of Sweden’s biggest energy producers, Göteborg Energi. Within the company’s area of operations, which is Sweden’s second-largest city of Göteborg, 60% of households are at- tached to the district heating network. The company’s annual produc- tion is 53 TWh. Even household washing machines use district heating to warm their water.


Within the framework of the Celsius project, fi ve cities will exchange experiences and help each other to break their dependence on fossil fuel. In addition to Göteborg, these are London, Genoa, Cologne and Rotterdam.


Speaking at World Bioenergy, Cognell stated that “It’s not possible to magic into existence a large-scale district heating network. You have to start small and then grow. In Göteborg we began with district heat- ing in the 1940s”.


He went on to describe a current project on the outskirts of London where a small district heating network has been built and runs on a 2 MW biomass boiler. Heat is also being recovered from the London Underground system. This venture demonstrates the challenges of working in a big city. The construction times are extremely brief so as not to disrupt traffi c. In addition, noisy facilities end up being built near homes, so this boiler cannot be operated after 10 pm.


6 6 July 2014


At the same time, London has large amounts of unexploited energy resources, including a large waste incineration plant where the energy being produced is not recovered.


There are strong incentives for London – and all of the UK – to change energy systems. He showed how the nation has gone from being an exporter of fossil fuel to now being a net importer of oil and gas.


The next step planned for Celsius is to use the experiences gained to convince other cities. The ultimate goal is to create 50 Smart Cities that break their fossil dependency and build effi cient district heating systems based on renewable fuels.


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