Perth’s hot rocks for cooling buildings

Geothermal is to become the energy source of choice for heating and cooling commercial buildings in Perth, claims Green Rock Energy Limited (ASX: GRK). It has been formally offered a Geothermal Exploration Permit in the Perth metropolitan area under WA’s recently enacted geothermal legislation, and it will now move to develop its first project at the University of Western Australia’s Crawley Campus.

The project is designed to replace a significant portion of the UWA’s Crawley Campus’ electricity powered compression chillers (that produce cold water for air-conditioning) with geothermal powered absorption chillers.

“This UWA based renewable energy project will be the first geothermal energy project undertaken under WA’s new geothermal legislation, the first geothermal powered absorption chiller in Australia and the first major geothermal project in WA. We aim to be the first major geothermal project in production in Australia,” says Green Rock MD Adrian Larking.

Green Rock Energy will drill two geothermal wells, to a depth of approximately 3,000m, to provide the 100˚C geothermal water to power a 5MW absorption chiller. One well, a production well, will be used to access and obtain the hot geothermal water and the other, an injection well, used to return the cooler geothermal water following the extraction of the geothermal energy by the absorption chiller.

By replacing conventional compression chiller plants that use electrical energy, large commercial buildings including universities, hospitals, hotels, airports, data centres and shopping centres can be air-conditioned using geothermal water as the principal power source.

This is particularly so in Perth which sits on a deep sedimentary basin up to 15km deep, with multiple heated aquifers. Following completion of the UWA Geothermal Energy Project, “the aim is to replace further air-conditioning capacity at the Crawley Campus and replication of the concept throughout the Perth metropolitan area”.

For more on this project go to: http://aspect.comsec.com.au/asxdata/20090702/pdf/00965905.pdf
Article sourced from: Article sourced from: http://www.environmentalmanagementnews.net

Carbon permits tip investors into generating power from rubbish

The Times reports that Britain's path to a low-carbon future may not be found in wind farms, but rather in rubbish. The pressure on the government to reduce the volume of waste dumped in landfills, along with huge financial incentives for the companies involved, is fuelling a boom in the waste-to-energy sector.

The Times Online reports that waste-to-energy is a catch-all term for ways of turning rubbish into power and by-products such as fertiliser.

To view the full article visit The Times Online at: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article6035724.ece. Information sourced from the Resource Recovery Forum: www.resourcesnotwaste.org

Talk the language of executives if you want change

In times of economic downturn, making the case for improvement and change becomes an invaluable skill. In the July Quality Progress offers articles for professionals to translate improvement and quality terms and principles into the language of executives.  “Talk the Talk” by Peter Sherman, helps you:

• Identify and understand various types of costs and their impact on margins.
• Use simple financial calculations to perform basic cost analysis.

For more on this article go to: http://www.asq.org/quality-progress/2009/07/cost-of-quality/all-ears.html

I&I comment: In my consulting with various organisations I have found it necessary to coach managers and teams on how to calculate simply what benefits to an organisation a recommended change might make. For example, does it reduce equipment downtime and if so what is the cost of that downtime to the organisation? Does it reduce other losses such as non-conforming products? Does it save employee time? In order to have any chance of getting the organisation’s leadership to run with the recommendations it is often essential that the recommended changes be quantified in dollar terms. If you want to discuss this issue further either email a comment below, phone me on 0419 841829 or click here->

From toilets to energy?

A £4.3 million biogas-to-renewable power scheme believed to be the first of its kind in the UK is being developed using wastewater sludge from Manchester homes. The pilot to pump biogas through the local gas pipeline is expected to be up and running by 2011. Biogas generated from waste could directly heat about half the homes in the UK in the long term, a previous report by Ernst & Young for the National Grid has said. The utility said supplying biogas to homes using existing gas grid pipelines under its control, would be more efficient than the existing practice of burning the gas from landfill and sewage works sites to produce electricity.

Under the newly announced pilot, about 500 homes will receive the biogas supply.
The pilot project, based at one of UK’s largest wastewater treatment plants at Davyhulme, Manchester, will allow water company United Utilities and electricity utility National Grid to compare the efficiency and cost of three main uses for biogas – onsite combined heat and power generation, gas grid injection and vehicle fuel.

Biogas from anaerobic digestion facilities at the Davyhulme sewage treatment works will be diverted into an upgrading plant for injection into the natural gas network, with about 250 cubic metres of biogas per hour expected to be processed, generating 167 cubic metres of clean biomethane hourly.

More than half will go into National Grid's local gas distribution network, while the rest will be used as fuel for 24 of United Utilities’ sludge tankers.

The Davyhulme plant has the “overall potential of biomethane… to supply a small town of about 5,000 homes”.

For more on the pilot project go to: http://www.nationalgrid.com/uk/Media+Centre/PressReleases/15.06.09.htm
Article sourced from: http://www.environmentalmanagementnews.net      

Project to end waste of ash, wood, TV glass and tyres

The UK’s Environment Agency (EA) has announced the four new materials that will form part of its Quality Protocols project which aims to define end-of-waste criteria for waste streams.
The four materials are the following:

• Treated ash from the incineration of poultry litter, feathers and straw, which can be re-used as a fertiliser, substituting inorganic fertilisers;
• Non-virgin wood from post-industrial and post-consumer sources which can be used in place of virgin wood;
• CRT glass from televisions, computer monitors and other display equipment which is used for aggregate in road construction or can substitute virgin sand or aggregate;
• Compressed tyre bales which could be used as a lightweight fill; a water attenuation systems; for noise absorption or as a substitute virgin aggregates.

EA head of environment and business partnerships project executive Martin Brocklehurst said: “We are determined to do all that we can to encourage the recovery re-use of discarded raw materials contained in waste. It makes no sense that we landfill valuable raw materials. The Waste Protocols Project will look at the current environmental risk posed by the four types of waste and establish end-of-waste criteria. This will clarify when regulations apply by establishing the point at which a waste-derived material is fully recovered, and no longer subject to waste management controls. This approach to regulation allows us to focus our resources on higher risk activities and cut red tape by removing regulations where they are unnecessary.”

The EA said that the project will make it easier to turn industrial and commercial waste into useable new materials to save businesses time and money.

Waste & Resources Action Programme (WRAP) market development director Marcus Gover said: “By complying with Quality Protocols businesses that produce or reprocess waste get rid of the stigma surrounding the waste label, making their waste derived products more marketable and attractive to buyers. As well as cutting costs, the project is helping to increase sales for businesses by building consumer confidence and value for waste-derived products in the market place.”

The Quality Protocols project is a partnership project between industry, the EA and WRAP.

The Agency said that the four materials were chosen from a list of 15 applications submitted by business, in a process that it began in January 2009.

http://www.mrw.co.uk/page.cfm/action=Archive/ArchiveID=10/EntryID=5603

Article sourced from www.resourcesnotwaste.org

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