Waste Heat Recovery System on Reciprocating Engines Planned for Bradford County, Pennsylvania Compressor Facility

LAKE FOREST, Ill., Dec. 6, 2011 /PRNewswire/ – Today, KGRA Energy LP, a premier U.S.-based developer of waste heat recovery power generation projects, announced that it will develop a pioneering waste heat recovery project to harness reciprocating engine exhaust heat. KGRA and Appalachian Midstream Services, LLC, a subsidiary of Chesapeake Energy Corporation (NYSE: CHK), have signed a definitive agreement to build and install a customized 2MW waste heat-to-power system. Chesapeake is the nation’s second-largest producer of natural gas and will work with KGRA’s subsidiary, Liberty WHR Partners LLC, to install the alternative energy project at one of its Marcellus Shale gas gathering compression facilities in Bradford County, Pennsylvania. KGRA’s system will convert waste heat from a series of compressor engines into retail grade electricity. The power can be used on site and/or sold back into the grid by KGRA. Two megawatts is enough electricity to power over 1,600 homes in Bradford County.

“KGRA is pleased to have been selected by Chesapeake, a company that views waste heat recovery as a realistic way to increase efficiencies utilizing an emissions-free power source,” said Jason Gold, KGRA Energy’s Chief Executive Officer. Noting the project will create and sustain numerous American jobs, Mr. Gold said, “We look forward to breaking ground early next year and building a long term-partnership with Chesapeake.”

“We took a keen interest in the application of this technology when KGRA Energy first approached us,” said J. Mike Stice, Chesapeake’s Senior Vice President – Natural Gas Projects and President of Chesapeake Midstream Development (NYSE: CHKM). ”We view this as a trailblazing opportunity for not only Chesapeake, but for the midstream industry, to convert a heat byproduct into emissions-free electric power. Chesapeake is known to develop and champion new technology, and likewise supports novel technology applications such as KGRA’s that can create a visible, sustainable impact in our business and in our community.”

KGRA will begin installation of the power generation project as early as the first quarter of 2012. The company previously received a $2.75 million commitment from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and $500,000 from the Community Foundation for the Alleghenies toward the development of this project. Upon its completion, the project will produce more than 16.6 million kilowatt-hours per year of emissions-free electricity, displacing approximately 16,000 metric tons of CO2 emissions per year that might otherwise be produced by a typical coal-fired power plant.

KGRA Energy uses ORC (Organic Rankine Cycle) technology to recover waste heat from viable sources such as combustion engine exhausts, furnaces, boilers and kilns, converting it into usable CO2-free electricity, which lowers energy costs as well as heat pollution.  KGRA’s power generation project at the Chesapeake site will feature a custom-designed waste heat recovery unit that harvests exhaust from five reciprocating engines using interposing oil loops, which have been designed with various levels of redundancy to meet the safety and back-pressure demands of lean-burn gas engines. The system is closed-loop, requires no water, and uses a non-ozone depleting and EPA approved refrigerant. KGRA has selected TAS Energy LLC, a subsidiary of Turbine Air Systems, LTD, to provide the ORC power module which will be made in Houston.

About KGRA Energy LP

KGRA Energy LP is a premier developer of customized renewable energy power generation projects. The company manages the design, construction and installation of organic Rankine cycle waste heat recovery systems that create CO2-free renewable energy for business and utility clients. KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable and produce power from waste heat sources deemed unsuitable for traditional cogeneration. KGRA enables pulp and paper, lumber, refinery, cement, power plant and midstream gas transmission clients to convert waste heat to usable electricity, reduce energy costs, lower carbon footprints and create a sustainable future. Visit www.kgraenergy.com for more information.

About Appalachian Midstream Services

Appalachia Midstream Services, L.L.C. is a subsidiary of Chesapeake Midstream (NYSE: CHKM) with operations in Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York and West Virginia. Chesapeake Midstream provides pipeline infrastructure for Chesapeake Energy Corporation’s production operations and services to gather, compress, process and treat natural gas and natural gas liquids. Headquartered in Oklahoma City, OK, Chesapeake Midstream’s operations are located in the top shale plays in the United States and have over 5,200 miles of active pipeline connected to more than 7,300 Chesapeake wells.

Contact:   Jason Gold
P: 646-307-8840 x1002
jason@kgraenergy.com

SOURCE KGRA Energy LP

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The project, which has been called Nechako Green Energy, will use a portion of the steam waste that is currently emitted from the mill and will turn it into electricity.

Nechako Lumber will be the first sawmill in North America to use this new technology.

“Today we are starting a new partnership,” said Alan Fitzpatrick General Manager of Nechako Lumber during his speech at the project kick-off ceremony on Thursday.

“This is really something that we should all be proud of.”

Nechako Lakes MLA John Rustad and Vanderhoof Mayor Gerry Thiessen also spoke at the event.

“This technology is utilizing waste so you don’t need any additional fibre you’re just actually capturing the heat that’s going up your smoke stack and creating power with it,” said Rustad.

“It’s low-cost power and it displaces the power that is currently being used.

“Also this technology has the potential to be put in every single mill across the province,” he added.

The project has been in the works for approximately eight months. The kick-off ceremony marked the start of the construction of a new facility that will house the project and the equipment required to convert the waste heat into power.

The innovative technology that is being used is called Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC) technology which uses an organic fluid that vaporizes at a lower temperature than the water-steam phase change. The fluid allows Rankine cycle heat recovery from lower temperature sources such as biomass combustion, industrial waste heat and geothermal heat etc. The low-temperature heat can then be converted into electricity.

The amount of electricity that will be created will be enough to power a third of the operations at Nechako Lumber, the equivalent of powering a town the size of Vanderhoof.

Approximately 20 per cent of the steam will be utilized.

“This is really a win-win for everyone,” said Thiessen.

“It’s an exciting day for our community when it comes to waste and reducing our waste,” he added.

The $7 million project is being partly funded by the Government of Canada through Natural Resources Canada and BC Hydro has also put forward $4 million towards the project.

For further information:
www.bclocalnews.com

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Media Contact:
Carter Brown

Chief Financial Officer
(773) 835-3834
carter@kgraenergy.com

KGRA Energy, LLC Awarded “Most Promising Energy & Clean Technology Company” at Rice Alliance Energy & Clean Technology Venture Forum

HOUSTON – September 21, 2009 – KGRA ENERGY, LLC was named one of the Most Promising Energy & Clean Technology Companies at the 7th Annual Rice Alliance for Technology & Entrepreneurship Energy & Clean Technology Venture Forum in Houston last week.   Energy & Clean Technology companies showcased their new ventures for an audience of more than 625 attendees, including investors, venture capitalists, industry representatives, business leaders, advisors/mentors, service providers, and entrepreneurs. 

KGRA Energy develops small scale, modular geothermal power generation assets.  The company avoids the costs and risks associated with drilling for its fuel by leveraging the heat associated with the extraction, processing, and distribution of hydrocarbons to produce power.  KGRA employs a fully-financed solution to provide its customers with clean, renewable energy.

Jason Gold, KGRA’s Chief Executive Officer commented on the award, "There were numerous companies at this conference that presented outstanding technologies, business models and opportunities.   We were honored to be included among this impressive list of presenting companies and are very grateful to the judges for selecting us to receive this award."   

The one day event culminated in an announcement of the Most Promising Energy & Clean Technology Companies chosen from nearly 60 competitors and judged by the Rice Alliance Energy Advisory Board, based on the companies’ elevator pitch presentations. The exercise simulates meeting an investor on an elevator and having only 90 seconds to convince them to invest in your company.

Rice Alliance Director Brad Burke, announced the winners of the Most Promising Energy & Clean Technology Company awards at the event. "Every year the quality of companies improves. Many of the companies at this year’s event have developed prototypes, obtained proven results and are on their second round of funding. This makes them more appealing to investors, who have also expressed appreciation for the quality of the companies."

The Forum was supported by Chevron Technology Ventures, Energy Ventures, Shell, Kenda Capital, Huron Consulting Group, Canada Consulate General, Winstead, Leyendecker & Associates, Hart Energy Publishing with supporting organizations Greater Houston Partnership, Houston Technology Center, and Opportunity Houston and media sponsors Houston Business Journal and the BusinessMakers Radio Show.

The organisation launched a new guide to the technology this week, which it says can give a quick payback by collecting and re-using heat that would otherwise be lost from ventilation systems, boiler gases, air compressors and refrigeration equipment.

“Waste heat and you are wasting money,” says Carbon Trust programme director Richard Rugg. “From office-based businesses to retailers and manufacturers, there are significant opportunities to recover and reuse heat, save money and boost your bottom line.”

A typical supermarket, for example, could cover 75-90% of its hot water needs by recovering heat from refrigeration units and reduce its total CO₂ emissions by 2-3%.

Businesses, meanwhile, can install de-superheaters to capture heat from cooling equipment – including that used for servers – to provide space heating or hot water. A new 250-person office could save around £1000 on annual gas bills in this way.

Heat can also be recovered from ventilation systems and industrial process equipment, including air compressors, boilers and even sterilisation systems used in the food and drinks industry.

For further information:
www.carbontrust.co.uk/expertinenergy

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Standing out amid a sea of newfangled energy solutions takes ingenuity, to be sure. It takes capital. It takes scale. And sometimes it takes a dramatic statement.

That was the case in June in Riviera Beach, Fla., just across the Intracoastal Waterway from Palm Beach, when Florida Power & Light Co. demolished the twin striped stacks and 7,500-ton boilers at its nearly 50-year-old power plant to make way for construction of FPL’s US$1.3-billion Riviera Beach Next Generation Clean Energy Center.

Scheduled to open in 2014, the new power plant, which has a 30-year operational lifetime, will use high-efficiency, combined-cycle natural gas technology to produce up to 1,250 megawatts of electricity, or enough power for approximately 250,000 of FPL’s 4.5 million customers. Compared to the former plant, which used a blend of oil and natural gas, the new plant will cut the carbon dioxide emissions rate in half and generate power with more than 90 percent fewer air emissions without using any additional water or land. And it will even feature a free viewing area for the public to come watch the manatees, which for years have gathered during the colder winter months in the warm waters caused by water discharges from FPL’s five power plants in the state.

In the plant’s first full year of operation, it is expected to deliver $7 million to $9 million in new tax revenue for the City of Riviera Beach and over $20 million in new tax revenues in total.

FPL is similarly modernizing a 1960s-era site near Kennedy Space Center, Fla., where construction on the project began earlier this year and is scheduled to be completed in 2013. That’s the same location where, in April 2010, FPL and NASA commissioned FPL’s Space Coast Next Generation Solar Energy Center, producing about 10 MW of power on NASA property.

The facility features approximately 35,000 solar PV panels from SunPower Corp. arrayed across 60 acres (24 hectares). SunPower also designed and supplied FPL’s 25-megawatt DeSoto Next Generation Solar Energy Center in DeSoto County, the largest operating solar PV power plant in the U.S. SunPower has said it intends to locate an R&D center employing up to 50 employees in Florida if the state government continues to support the deployment of additional large-scale solar energy projects.

In July FPL announced yet another billion-dollar replacement plan for its Port Everglades power plant in Hollywood, Fla. where it hopes to demolish the old plant in 2013.

Taking the Heat

The blend of megaprojects from FPL is just one of many examples of companies choosing to move on from fretting about energy challenges and actually do something about them. Others abound. Some hold seeds of innovation that corporate end users may benefit from some day. Others may confer their benefits a lot sooner than that.

In northwest New South Wales, Australia, in July, a Education Investment Fund (EIF) $66.5-million grant from the Gillard Labor Government was awarded to fund research to help build one of the largest solar power plants in the world, the 150-MW Moree Solar Farm, which will power around 45,000 homes and perform research. The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) will lead a consortium of researchers from the University of New South Wales, the University of Newcastle and Hunter TAFE to conduct research at the proposed A$925-million project, whose investors include BP Solar, Fotowatio Renewable Ventures (FRV) and Pacific Hydro. Preliminary research will begin this year, with completion and commissioning of the plant expected by the end of 2015.

That’s not the only far-reaching solar project backed by CSIRO. In November, CSIRO announced it was building the largest solar-power tower of its type in the world at the National Solar Energy Centre in Newcastle, New South Wales, consisting of around 450 mirrors (heliostats) that will direct solar heat onto a 30-meter-high tower to produce super-heated compressed air for a Brayton Cycle turbine. “Most solar thermal power stations require water to operate a steam turbine to produce electricity,” explained a press release. “The Brayton Cycle technology does not need water. The technology is therefore ideally suited to many parts of Australia that only receive minimal rainfall.”

The Newcastle project was completed this summer, and occupies 43,057 sq. ft. (4,000 sq. m.). The heliostats are capable of concentrating solar energy at temperatures beyond 1,000ºC (1,832ºF).

While that project cranks up the heat, others seek to recover it from the waste stream. Such is the case near Greenville, N.C., where waste heat recovery developer KGRA Energy, in partnership with Turbine Air Systems Inc., is working to install an 800-kilowatt system that will capture waste heat from a kiln where lumber enters the drying process at a Weyerhaeuser mill and convert the captured thermal energy into clean electricity. In addition to providing 20 construction jobs (local contractor Roberts Co. is constructing most of the project), the system, when completed, will provide the mill approximately 4.5 million kilowatt-hours of emission-free electricity per year.

KGRA Energy’s system employs an organic Rankine cycle based power generation skid packaged by Turbine Air Systems at their factory in Houston.

Organic Rankine cycle has been deployed at more than 1,500 sites around the world. But it’s still new in some strata of the industrial world.

“Many astute facility managers have been aware of waste heat for some time,” says Jason Gold, CEO of KGRA Energy. “But to date the effort has been focused on the high-temperature stuff. Heat sources under 800 degrees are kind of cool to an industrial engineer. They’ve sort of ignored it, and that’s a very fertile market for us.”

KGRA pays for the system and then sells the power to the customer, either on a build-own-operate model with a long-term power purchase arrangement, or a model that allows the end user to purchase the system at a fixed price.

Sectors showing interest in the heat recovery systems include pulp, paper and timber; refineries and petrochemical operations; power plants; and even data centers, says Gold, as well as the steel and glass industries. Most of those sectors are large power consumers, affording KGRA the opportunity to make a large difference to their bottom lines. At some newsprint mills, for instance, portions of the mill may be shut down and therefore boilers are running below their rate of efficiency. “By installing our system, they can run their boilers at maximum efficiency, in addition to the power benefit, and leverage their fixed cost infrastructure,” says Gold.

In the cement industry, he says opportunities exists in the clinker cooler, where air blown across the clinker can reach 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit, and in preheat towers, where companies often spend money spraying water to cool the air. Gold says thermodynamics engineers at refineries have told him, “It’s killing me to watch this energy leave the stacks or be vented into the atmosphere,” but they haven’t been able to go attack it due to limited staff time, capital or c-suite prioritization.

Other projects from KGRA incude a system on a Kinder Morgan pipeline in Colorado, and another at an Energy Transfer natural gas processing station in Louisiana. Canada’s Enbridge has installed several. Systems have been installed abroad by Ciments du Maroc in Morocco and by Agrivis and Societa Agricola in Italy.

Gold says another factor in KGRA’s favor is the current and forthcoming regulatory environment with regard to emissions. Moreover, such projects can also sometimes take advantage of energy-efficiency incentive programs offered by utilities.

Tide’s Turning

In the Indian state of Gujarat in January, Singapore-based Atlantis Resources announced it would install a 50-MW tidal energy farm in the Gulf of Kutch off India’s western coast. The project, which could eventually grow to 200 MW of capacity, joins the global ranks of tidal energy farms or barrages, including projects in Wales, Korea, France, the Netherlands, Canada and Scotland. Atlantis is involved in several. Atlantis CEO Tim Cornelius said a study a few years ago revealed global “hot spots” for deployment of its 1-MW AK1000 turbines, including the Gulf of Kutch. With government support, the $150-million project is set to move forward, with some manufacturing supporting it to take place in India.

In October, a consortium including Atlantis was given the right to develop a 400-turbine tidal farm in the Pentland Firth in Scotland. Financial backers of Atlantis include Morgan Stanley, Statkraft SF of Norway and Singapore’s leading global fund, EDBI.

On top of the waves Down Under, Shell this spring instructed the Technip Samsung consortium (TSC) to proceed with construction of the first floating liquefied natural gas (FLNG) facility in the world. Moored 124 miles (200 km.) from the nearest land, the Prelude FLNG facility will produce gas from offshore fields and liquefy it onboard by cooling. Design of the facility will be undertaken by TSC at Technip’s operating centers in Paris, France, and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, and it will be built at the Samsung Heavy Industries shipyard in Geoje, Korea.

Shell anticipates pursuing more FLNG projects around the world. Shell’s upstream investment in Australia should reach some $30 billion over the next five years.

Lithium Chemistry Fuels Project Action

In July, Dow Chemical formed a JV with Japan’s Ube Industries called Advanced Electrolyte Technologies, which will open a factory next year in Dow’s hometown of Midland, Mich., that will produce 5,000 tons to 10,000 tons a year of formulated electrolytes, the conductive material in advanced batteries, for a global market estimated at 15,000 to 20,000 tons. Dow Kokam is in the midst of building a lithium-ion battery plant in Midland. The lithium-ion battery market is projected to reach $74 billion by 2020, with the electrolyte market reaching $1.2 billion. A Dow spokesman said the JV may build similar plants in Europe and China.

In Québec in April, a project from Süd-Chemie subsidiary Phostech Lithium that was announced last year received official government support from the province in the form of a C$7.4-million grant and training funds from Emploi-Québec for the company to establish a C$78-million, 50-job lithium iron phosphate (LFP) commercial production facility in Candiac, in the province’s Montérégie region.

LFP is a high-performance material with multiple applications, including energy storage for electric vehicle batteries. Production is expected to be 2,500 tons a year when the plant launches in 2012. Süd-Chemie already produces 300 tons per year at one of its primary plants in Moosburg, Germany. Via a licensing arrangement, another LFP plant is expected in Québec from Taiwanese firm Advanced Lithium Electrochemistry (Cayman) Co., Ltd (ALEEES).

Süd-Chemie’s penchant for energy innovation is not restricted to batteries. In late July, near the Bavarian BioCampus in Straubing, the company, now part of the Clariant Group, began construction of what will be the largest German plant for the manufacture of the climate-friendly biofuel cellulosic ethanol from agricultural waste materials. The 20-job operation will produce up to 1,000 metric tons of cellulosic ethanol per year, primarily from wheat straw from the Straubing area, an agricultural center in a region known as “the granary of Lower Bavaria.”

“The total project volume is around €28 million: €16 million in investment and just under €12 million for accompanying research measures,” said the company. The Bavarian state government and the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) have each contributed around €5 million into the project and related research initiatives.

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There is a growing clean energy technology geared towards the manufacturing mill, which has gained traction in the forest products industry: waste heat recovery.

Waste heat recovery integrates easily into existing mill infrastructures and employs a process called the organic Rankine cycle (ORC), which has been around since the 1960s. ORC units capture heat that is currently being released into the atmosphere from biomass, natural gas, or waste fired boilers and converts it into useable CO2-free electricity. While this technology has a small footprint (approximately the size of a tractor-trailer flatbed), it helps forest products companies maximize the efficiency of existing investments and resources (Figure 1.)

John Ryan, Region Energy Manager at Weyerhaeuser, describes waste heat recovery as “technology that is designed to produce clean energy, while reducing emissions and lowering a plant’s electricity bill.”

Weyerhaeuser is currently working with KGRA Energy on installing an 800kW system in its Greenville, NC lumber mill. In order to tap into Weyerhaeuser’s wasted heat, an ORC system will be installed within the mill’s biomass-based thermal drying system. Heat will then be recovered from the kiln, where cut lumber enters the drying process. Estimates have shown that the kiln will output enough waste heat to generate 4.5 million kWh of CO2-free electricity per year for the facility. And all of this comes from a technology that can fit on the back of a flatbed truck.

KGRA Energy is currently working on the development of a 10MW organic Rankine cycle (ORC) project at a newsprint and linerboard mill that will recover the facility’s waste heat and convert it into useable CO2-free electricity. The installation is slated to break ground in Q1 of 2012.

AN UNLIMITED MARKET
The market for waste heat recovery is virtually limitless. According to researchers at University California Berkley, the U.S. currently consumes about 100 quadrillion BTUs of energy per year. However, between 55 and 60 quadrillion BTUs are currently vented into the atmosphere as waste heat. With ORC technology, these emissions are harnessed on-site to generate useable CO2-free electricity that is fed directly back into a manufacturing process. Forest products operations are especially well-suited for waste heat recovery systems since they use large amounts of electricity and maintain consistent waste heat streams with temperatures between 400° and 800°F.

ORC employs environmentally benign refrigerants in a closed loop system that turns waste heat into useable electricity. Given its relative simplicity, carbon neutrality and diminutive physical footprint, ORC is one of the most inexpensive sources of renewable power generation. Also, its high utilization rate (95%) far eclipses the 25% – 35% utilization rates seen in other renewable technologies, such as solar and wind.

Recycled Energy Development conducted an analysis of Department of Energy data, finding that waste heat energy was one of the cheapest energy sources per megawatt hour (Figure 2). Currently, the capital upfront cost of waste heat recovery technology is approximately $3 million for a 1MW project. But the relative cost continues to decrease as the project grows larger, making waste heat cheaper than any other current new energy generation.

A wave of new project development activity has occurred as a result of rising energy costs and growing environmental concern. Recent improvements in the ORC manufacturing process have made the systems modular, customizable, and easily deployed. Also, the rise of independent project managers has also hastened adoption; allowing mills to focus on energy savings while project managers design, engineer, construct and operate the plants.

Waste heat recovery delivers a win-win clean energy solution. By tapping into existing but unused energy sources, forest products companies reduce energy spending, reduce carbon footprints and reduce dependence on non-renewable sources of energy. And that’s why waste heat is about to become a lot more relevant.

Jason Gold is the Chief Executive Officer of KGRA Energy, LP, a developer of electricity generation projects that harvest waste heat to create clean, renewable energy. Contact him at: info@kgraenergy.com.

Click Here to see Original Story.

There is a growing clean energy technology geared towards the manufacturing mill, which has gained traction in the forest products industry: waste heat recovery.

Waste heat recovery integrates easily into existing mill infrastructures and employs a process called the organic Rankine cycle (ORC), which has been around since the 1960s. ORC units capture heat that is currently being released into the atmosphere from biomass, natural gas, or waste fired boilers and converts it into useable CO2-free electricity. While this technology has a small footprint (approximately the size of a tractor-trailer flatbed), it helps forest products companies maximize the efficiency of existing investments and resources (Figure 1.)

John Ryan, Region Energy Manager at Weyerhaeuser, describes waste heat recovery as “technology that is designed to produce clean energy, while reducing emissions and lowering a plant’s electricity bill.”

Weyerhaeuser is currently working with KGRA Energy on installing an 800kW system in its Greenville, NC lumber mill. In order to tap into Weyerhaeuser’s wasted heat, an ORC system will be installed within the mill’s biomass-based thermal drying system. Heat will then be recovered from the kiln, where cut lumber enters the drying process. Estimates have shown that the kiln will output enough waste heat to generate 4.5 million kWh of CO2-free electricity per year for the facility. And all of this comes from a technology that can fit on the back of a flatbed truck.

KGRA Energy is currently working on the development of a 10MW organic Rankine cycle (ORC) project at a newsprint and linerboard mill that will recover the facility’s waste heat and convert it into useable CO2-free electricity. The installation is slated to break ground in Q1 of 2012.

AN UNLIMITED MARKET
The market for waste heat recovery is virtually limitless. According to researchers at University California Berkley, the U.S. currently consumes about 100 quadrillion BTUs of energy per year. However, between 55 and 60 quadrillion BTUs are currently vented into the atmosphere as waste heat. With ORC technology, these emissions are harnessed on-site to generate useable CO2-free electricity that is fed directly back into a manufacturing process. Forest products operations are especially well-suited for waste heat recovery systems since they use large amounts of electricity and maintain consistent waste heat streams with temperatures between 400° and 800°F.

ORC employs environmentally benign refrigerants in a closed loop system that turns waste heat into useable electricity. Given its relative simplicity, carbon neutrality and diminutive physical footprint, ORC is one of the most inexpensive sources of renewable power generation. Also, its high utilization rate (95%) far eclipses the 25% – 35% utilization rates seen in other renewable technologies, such as solar and wind.

Recycled Energy Development conducted an analysis of Department of Energy data, finding that waste heat energy was one of the cheapest energy sources per megawatt hour (Figure 2). Currently, the capital upfront cost of waste heat recovery technology is approximately $3 million for a 1MW project. But the relative cost continues to decrease as the project grows larger, making waste heat cheaper than any other current new energy generation.

A wave of new project development activity has occurred as a result of rising energy costs and growing environmental concern. Recent improvements in the ORC manufacturing process have made the systems modular, customizable, and easily deployed. Also, the rise of independent project managers has also hastened adoption; allowing mills to focus on energy savings while project managers design, engineer, construct and operate the plants.

Waste heat recovery delivers a win-win clean energy solution. By tapping into existing but unused energy sources, forest products companies reduce energy spending, reduce carbon footprints and reduce dependence on non-renewable sources of energy. And that’s why waste heat is about to become a lot more relevant.

Jason Gold is the Chief Executive Officer of KGRA Energy, LP, a developer of electricity generation projects that harvest waste heat to create clean, renewable energy. Contact him at: info@kgraenergy.com.

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According to the International Energy Agency most companies use up to 50% more energy than they need to as a matter of course. Yet, with the right technology, most, if not all, of that energy is recoverable says Alfa Laval. And the savings wouldn’t be insignificant. Some authoritative sources claim that they would be equivalent to three times the total current output of the global nuclear industry.

Alfa Laval has produced an informative, fact-filled booklet. Waste Heat Recovery – Optimising your energy system, that spells out the potential benefits; highlighting where energy is most likely to be wasted; how to recover heat and recycle it to reduce energy consumption; how to profit from greater energy efficiency and how to transform waste heat recovered from one source into productive heat for another.

Click here to read more

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Industry can’t exist without water. Producing anything involves heat. When you’re a manufacturing facility, you’re lucky to be pushing out exhaust heat at less than 400 degrees Fahrenheit.

It costs water to make steel, water to make cement, even water to make solar PV panels and wind turbines. And then it costs water to continue to run things. For example, your average solar parabolic plant sucks up between 760 and 920 gallons for every megawatt hour produced. (Editor’s Note: wind and solar PV use a ton less than other power generation options, though.)

Every manufacturing or industrial power process requires heat to make its product. And, currently, the method most plants rely on to curb their excess heat is steam generation. It sounds great on paper, using the excess heat to convert water to steam, which produces energy that can be fed directly back into the process. But, in reality, steam generation needs a lot more water to work, wasting almost 2,300 gallons of water for every megawatt hour of energy generated (according to the U.S. Geological Survey).

Fresh water is the most essential commodity on earth, and yet, it is a scarce natural resource. According to the National Renewable Energy Lab, thermoelectric power alone accounts for 39% of all water consumption in the U.S., consuming over 200 million gallons per day. And the majority of that water is used to cool our heated power-production equipment.

But what would you say if I told you there has been a water-free technology in existence for more than fifty years that manufacturing facilities can use to cool their systems? And there’s a good chance you haven’t even heard of it, despite its recent popularity.

The water-free technology I’m referring to is the organic Rankine cycle (or “ORC”), which traces its roots to the geothermal power generation sector, where it was first popularized in the late 1960s. These systems operate on the same basic principle as the traditional steam cycle, with two important differences: ORCs use a contained environmental refrigerant instead of water and ORCs are closed-loop, meaning they don’t need anything coming in or going out to run.

ORC Process
The ORC process uses its environmental refrigerant to cool all of that exhaust heat running through it. The refrigerant moves through a closed-loop system, turning from liquid to steam and back to liquid again. It produces continuous power, is completely self-sustainable, and has a lifespan of at least 20 years. And despite its long-standing popularity in Europe, with over 100 working installations, the U.S. is only now beginning to realize its benefits.
That’s because, historically, industrial operations haven’t had to worry much about the availability of water or the regulations pertaining to the precious natural resource. But things are taking a turn. Public attention continues to grow around the issue of water scarcity. Its status as a precious resource has changed the mentality of power plant developers as they continue to absorb higher costs and struggle with water permitting authorities to bring projects to fruition. This translates into higher power costs for all customers – both industrial and consumer alike.
ORC’s Growing Popularity in U.S.

With the change in public mentality, public awareness of ORC is spiking. In particular, industrial and power plant operators have accelerated efforts to work with project developers on ORC-based “waste heat recovery” systems. Across the nation, more than 25 projects have already been completed by a number of developers, with many more in the pipeline.
These waste heat recovery projects harvest the excess thermal energy that is typically vented into the atmosphere by cooling it and repurposing it for power generation. By using organic working fluids with low vapor points and high molecular density, ORC has become more attractive than water itself.

Steel mills, power plants, oil fields, cement plants, paper mills, and refineries are just a few examples of large industrial facilities that have both usable waste heat and a large appetite for electricity. Through the use of ORC-based waste heat recovery, these operations are quickly and easily reducing their demand for the traditional water-cooled steam plants – putting water savings in the millions of gallons per year. And on top of that, the byproduct is clean and green energy that feeds directly back into the plant, pumping out power in the megawatts.
The ORC process is transforming the competitive landscape. ORC systems can be installed quickly, have a small footprint, low maintenance costs, closed-loop systems and range of temperatures they can siphon heat from. Plant managers are making ORC their next big priority, to reduce their dependence on water-based cooling processes, reduce their environmental footprint, reduce costs, improve efficiencies and give them a competitive edge.
Jason Gold is the Chief Executive Officer of KGRA Energy, LP, a developer of electricity generation projects that harvest waste heat to create clean, renewable energy.
Source: Clean Technica (http://s.tt/1358f)

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The system, designed and constructed by Illinois-based KGRA Energy, will be installed in the lumber mill’s energy area, near three large biomass boilers that heat thermal oil for the mill’s drying system, according to Jason Gold, KGRA CEO. The heat will be recovered from a kiln where cut lumber enters the drying process. “We are tapping into that thermal oil loop,” he explained, adding that the temperature runs just below 500 degrees Fahrenheit. “We are diverting some of that oil into our system and returning it back into their system after taking some of the energy out of that loop, and we’re making electricity with it.”

Weyerhaeuser will lease the system, self-produce the electricity and use it all on-site, Gold said. The process will save the lumber mill money on electric bills; reduce pollutants on-site; and create several local jobs during installation, Gold said. Beginning in June, that installation is expedited by the fact that KGRA’s systems are modular and designed for rapid installation with minimal impact to the customers’ own systems. “We do everything we can to preassemble and effectively prefabricate everything about this so that our on-site installation is substantially minimized,” Gold said.

KGRA Energy’s system is designed to recover waste heat from viable sources such as combustion engine exhausts, furnaces, boilers and kilns, converting it into electricity. Gold said the timber products industry holds a number of prime candidates for such as system, including pulp and paper mills.

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A pilot project is expected to enter the testing phase at the Hanrahan Road facility this summer. About 10 workers from The Roberts Co. in Winterville are installing the renewable energy system.

Once it’s in operation, the system will use hot oil recovered from a kiln that dries lumber. Heat from the oil will convert a liquid refrigerant into gas that will operate a turbine to generate electricity. The system will be tied to a transformer and could provide about 4.5 million kilowatt hours of 100-percent emission-free electricity.

It’s a closed-loop system, and heated gas will be transported back to an evaporative cooler, where it will be converted back to a liquid so the cycle can be repeated, officials said.

“It helps us capture some of our heat that we generate here to generate electricity,” said Mack Burks, unit manager of the facility. “It’s using the energy that we already have from heat to lessen our dependence on other forms of electricity.”

The system, including a skid that produces the power, and the cooling generator were manufactured by Houston-based TAS Energy Inc.

KGRA Energy LP, an Illinois developer of renewable energy power generation products, partnered with TAS Energy to bring the system to Weyerhaeuser.

Jason Gold, KGRA’s chief executive officer and founder, said the organic Rankine cycle system has been used primarily in the oil and gas industries, not at companies like Weyerhaeuser.

“This is the first ORC installation at any pulp, paper or timber mill in the United States,” he said.

It’s an untapped market that Gold sees as prime territory for expansion.

“They have lots of waste heat at those facilities, and they consume lots of power,” he said. “We are generating electricity without burning additional fossil fuel.”

Burks said the green energy process could be a go for other Weyerhaeuser facilities depending on the success of this pilot project.

Weyerhaeuser Co. is the world’s largest forest products companies.

The company grows and harvests trees. At the Grifton facility, lumber is produced.

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LAKE FOREST, Ill., Aug. 2, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Today, KGRA Energy, LP, a premier U.S.-based developer of waste heat recovery power generation projects, announced that it has received a $1.95M commitment from the State of Louisiana Department of Natural Resources toward the installation of a large scale waste heat recovery system in central Louisiana. The grant, provided by the EmPower Louisiana Renewable Energy Grant Program, will contribute to the development of a 10MW organic Rankine cycle (ORC) project that will recover waste heat and convert it into useable CO2-free electricity at a newsprint and linerboard mill. The installation is slated to break ground in Q1 of 2012.

“KGRA Energy is delighted to have received this funding from the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources and we commend Governor Jindal for his commitment to promoting clean energy programs,” said Carter Brown, KGRA chief financial officer. “The installation planned in Louisiana will not only reduce emissions, but will create local jobs throughout its construction and implementation.”

KGRA Energy’s systems use ORC to recover waste heat from viable sources, such as combustion engine exhausts, furnaces, boilers, and kilns, converting it into usable CO2-free electricity. The ORC process uses organic, environmentally benign, refrigerants that are able to produce electricity from lower-temperature heat sources and in water-restricted environments. The technology lowers energy costs as well as heat pollution. KGRA, a client company of the Houston Technology Center, is an independent project developer, customizing each project for the direct needs and specifications of the individual customer

About KGRA Energy LP

KGRA Energy LP is a premier developer of customized renewable energy power generation projects. The company manages the design, construction and installation of organic Rankine cycle waste heat recovery systems that create CO2-free renewable energy for business and utility clients. KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable and produce power from waste heat sources deemed unsuitable for traditional cogeneration. KGRA enables pulp and paper, lumber, refinery, cement and power plant clients to convert waste heat to usable electricity, reduce energy costs, lower carbon footprints and create a sustainable future. Visit www.kgraenergy.com for more information. KGRA Energy, LP is a Client Company of the Houston Technology Center.

The ORC process uses organic, environmentally benign refrigerants that are able to produce electricity from low-temperature heat sources and in water-restricted environments. ORC technology has a small footprint—approximately the size of a tractor-trailer flatbed. Interest in this energy generating skid is on the rise as companies look to maximize the efficiency of existing investments and infrastructures.

This technology has a proven track record with more than 150 installations in operation around the world—including 25 in the US—that have produced millions of hours of emission-free electricity. Given its relative simplicity, carbon neutrality and diminutive physical footprint, ORC is also one of the cheapest sources of renewable power generation currently available. The economic benefits of waste heat recovery systems are significant when compared to wind or solar power generation. ORC’s utilization factor of more than 95% far eclipses the 25% to 35% utilization factors seen in other renewable solutions like wind and solar.

The market for waste heat recovery is virtually limitless. According to researchers at University California Berkley, the US currently consumes about 100 quadrillion BTUs of energy per year. However, between 55 and 60 quadrillion BTUs are currently vented into the atmosphere as unused waste heat. With ORC technology, these emissions are harnessed on-site to generate useable CO2-free electricity that is fed directly back into a manufacturing process. Pulp and paper, lumber, refinery, cement, and power plant operations are especially well suited for waste heat recovery systems since they consume large amounts of electricity and maintain consistent waste heat streams with temperatures between 400° F and 800° F.

A wave of new focus and project development activity has occurred as a result of rising energy costs, growing environmental concern, and improvements to the ORC manufacturing process. Today’s new systems are modular, customizable, easily deployed, and economical to the facilities that deploy them.

The rise of independent project developers and new financing models have also helped accelerate customer adoption of waste heat recovery systems. Project developers shoulder the responsibilities of designing, engineering, constructing, and operating the ORC systems for their industrial customers. Additionally, project developers can offer customers financing options that allow resource-constrained organizations to explore the myriad benefits of waste heat recovery projects. Popular financing options include the purchase of a complete turnkey power system, leasing the system, or simply purchasing energy produced from a system installed at their site. The latter model, often referred to as the “PPA Model” (because the customer enters into a Power Purchase Agreement), relieves a company of capital expenditures and substantially shortens the sales cycle for new ORC systems. After all, who can say “no” to an offer of clean electricity, at a lower price than the utility can deliver, without any capital investment?

Facility managers, environmental experts, and forward-thinking legislators are beginning to recognize waste heat recovery as a win-win clean energy solution. Now it is time to get Congress to pay attention to this renewable energy “hidden gem” and recognize waste heat as a renewable resource eligible for tax and environmental credits. By tapping into existing but unused energy sources, American companies can reduce energy spending, reduce carbon footprints, and reduce dependence on non-renewable sources of energy. And that’s why waste heat is about to become a lot more relevant.

Jason Gold is the Chief Executive Officer of KGRA Energy, LP, a developer of electricity generation projects that harvest waste heat to create clean, renewable energy

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Every manufacturing process requires heat to produce materials and goods. And the cheapest and fastest way to cool that heat down is through water; more specifically, steam generation. The good news is that all of the fast moving water that’s heated to steam flows through a turbine generator and actually produces energy that is fed back into the process. This is known as a condensing turbine, which uses steam to recover energy. The bad news is that according to the U.S. Geological Survey, almost 2,300 gallons of water are wasted for every megawatt hour of energy generated.

Fresh water is one of our planet’s scarcest natural resources. According to the National Renewable Energy Lab, thermoelectric power alone accounts for 39 percent of all water consumption in the U.S., consuming over 200 million gallons per day. And the majority of that water is used to cool our heated power-production equipment.

But why are manufacturing facilities using water to cool their systems when there has been a water-free technology in existence for more than 50 years?

The water-free technology I’m referring to is the organic Rankine cycle (or “ORC”), which traces its roots to the geothermal power generation sector, where it was first popularized in the late 1960s. These systems operate on the same basic principle as the traditional steam cycle with two notable exceptions: ORCs use a contained organic working fluid (typically an environmental refrigerant) instead of water, and ORCs do not require water for cooling.

ORC that takes all of that exhaust heat and cools it using an environmentally benign refrigerant. The refrigerant moves through a closed loop system, turning from liquid to steam and back to liquid again. It produces continuous power, is completely self sustainable and has a lifespan of at least 20 years. And despite its long-standing popularity in Europe, with over 100 working installations, the technology has suddenly begun to rise in popularity in the U.S.

Historically, industrial operations haven’t had to worry much about the availability of water or the regulations pertaining to the precious natural resource. But things are taking a turn.

Public attention continues to grow around the issue of water scarcity. Its status as a precious resource is forcing power plant developers to absorb new and higher costs as they wrestle with water permitting authorities to bring projects to fruition. This translates into higher power costs for all customers – both industrial and consumer alike.

The good news is that public awareness of ORC is rising quickly. In particular, industrial and power plant operators have accelerated efforts to work with project developers on ORC-based “waste heat recovery” systems. Across the nation, more than 25 projects have already been completed by a number of developers, with many more in the pipeline.

These waste heat recovery projects harvest the excess thermal energy that is typically vented into the atmosphere by cooling it and repurposing it for power generation. It is the use of organic working fluids with low vapor points and high molecular densities that makes this possible.

Steel mills, power plants, oil fields, cement plants, paper mills, and refineries are just a few examples of large industrial facilities that have both usable waste heat and a large appetite for electricity. Through the use of ORC-based waste heat recovery, these operations are quickly and easily reducing their demand for the traditional water-cooled steam plants – putting water savings in the millions of gallons per year. And on top of that, the byproduct is clean energy that feeds directly back into the plant, pumping out power in the megawatts.

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KGRA is currently installing the world’s first ORC project in the pulp, paper & wood industry, at a large North Carolina lumber mill operated by Weyerhaeuser Company. The 800-kilowatt (kW) Weyerhaeuser installation will generate usable carbon dioxide (CO₂)-free electricity, NC facility, which will displace more than 9 million pounds of CO₂ each year and create 20 American jobs in the development, construction and installation process.

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KGRA manages the design, construction and installation of organic Rankine cycle (ORC) waste heat recovery systems that create CO₂-free renewable energy for business and utility clients. KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable and produce power from waste heat sources deemed unsuitable for traditional cogeneration. KGRA enables pulp and paper, lumber, refinery, cement, datacenter, and power plant clients to convert waste heat to usable electricity, reduce energy costs, lower carbon footprints and create a sustainable future.

KGRA’s unique business solution involves the corporation owning and operating the heat recovery facilities for its customers. This allows the customer to enjoy all the benefits of recycling their wasted heat without any capital outlay. For customers that have a sufficient electric load, KGRA supplies them with low-cost power from the system. For those with smaller electric loads, KGRA will sell the produced power into the grid and provide the heat host a royalty. This system provides the customer with the ability to remain entirely and exclusively focused on their core business operations.

Corporate Headquarters:

Lake Forest, IL
www.kgraenergy.com

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LAKE FOREST, Ill., July 25, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — KGRA Energy LP, a premier U.S.-based waste heat recovery developer, announced today that civil engineering has begun and equipment delivery continues on an innovative clean energy system being installed at a Greenville, NC area mill owned by Weyerhaeuser Company (NYSE:WY), one of the world’s largest forest products companies. The project, developed by KGRA Energy, in partnership with Turbine Air Systems Inc., will capture waste heat from the mill and covert the captured thermal energy into clean electricity.

The project will create approximately 20 construction jobs in Ayden, NC, where the mill is located. Roberts Company, a Winterville, North Carolina-based constructor is constructing the balance of plant for the project. When completed, the project will provide Weyerhaeuser’s mill approximately 4.5 million kilowatt hours of 100 percent emission free electricity per year and displace the equivalent of more than 9 million pounds of carbon dioxide each year.

KGRA Energy’s system employs an organic Rankine cycle based power generation skid packaged by Turbine Air Systems at their Houston, TX factory. This skid, scheduled to arrive the first week of August will convert the mill’s waste heat to useable energy. At the Weyerhaeuser lumber mill, heat will be recovered from a kiln where cut lumber enters the drying process.

Organic Rankine cycle technology recovers waste heat from viable sources, such as combustion engine exhausts, furnaces, boilers, and kilns, and converts it into usable CO2-free electricity, which lowers energy costs as well as heat pollution. Organic Rankine cycle has been tested and deployed since the 1960s. It is the primary power generation tool used in the low-temperature heat recovery industry and has been deployed at more than 1,500 sites throughout the US and around the world.

KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable, providing the ability to produce power from smaller and lower-temperature heat sources previously deemed unsuitable for standard cogeneration. KGRA projects are customized for the direct needs and specifications of each customer.

About KGRA Energy LP

KGRA Energy LP is a premier developer of customized renewable energy power generation projects. The company manages the design, construction and installation of organic Rankine cycle waste heat recovery systems that create CO2-free renewable energy for business and utility clients. KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable and produce power from waste heat sources deemed unsuitable for traditional cogeneration. KGRA enables pulp and paper, lumber, refinery, cement and power plant clients to convert waste heat to usable electricity, reduce energy costs, lower carbon footprints and create a sustainable future. Visit www.kgraenergy.com for more information.

About Weyerhaeuser Company

Weyerhaeuser Company, one of the world’s largest forest products companies, began operations in 1900. We grow and harvest trees, build homes and make a range of forest products essential to everyday lives. We manage our timberland on a sustainable basis in compliance with internationally recognized forestry standards. At the end of 2010, we employed approximately 14,000 employees in 10 countries. We have customers worldwide and generated $6.6 billion in sales in 2010. Our stock trades on the New York Stock exchange under the symbol WY. Additional information about us is available at www.weyerhaeuser.com.

About TAS Energy

TAS Energy Inc. is a technology company providing clean economic power solutions by focusing on the energy efficiency and renewable energy markets. TAS designs and manufactures modular energy conversion and cooling systems for the power generation industry; district, commercial and industrial process cooling; mission critical; and the renewable energy sector. TAS specializes in high efficiency standard product designs optimized for high life cycle return performance. Its product capabilities include geothermal and industrial waste heat power generation solutions, gas fired generation augmentation, chilled water systems, modular data centers and clean heat and power on-site energy systems. More can be learned at http://www.tas.com/.

Waste heat recovery employs a process that has been around since the 1960s, called the organic Rankine cycle (ORC), which easily integrates into existing manufacturing infrastructures. ORC units capture heat that is currently being released into the atmosphere and converts it into useable CO2-free electricity.

The ORC process uses organic, environmentally benign, refrigerants that are able to produce electricity from low-temperature heat sources and in water-restricted environments. ORC technology has a small footprint, approximately the size of a tractor trailer flatbed. Interest in this energy-generating skid is on the rise as companies look to maximize the efficiency of existing investments and infrastructures.

The technology has a proven track record with more than 150 installations in operation around the world – including 25 in the U.S. – that have produced millions of hours of emission-free electricity. Given its relative simplicity, carbon neutrality and diminutive physical footprint, ORC is also one of the cheapest sources of renewable power generation currently available. The economic benefits of waste heat recovery systems are significant when compared to wind or solar power generation. ORC’s utilization factor of more than 95% far eclipses the 25-35% utilization factors seen in other renewable solutions like wind and solar.

The market for waste heat recovery is virtually limitless. According to researchers at University California Berkley, the U.S. currently consumes about 100 quadrillion BTUs of energy per year. However, between 55 and 60 quadrillion BTUs are currently vented into the atmosphere as unused waste heat. With ORC technology, these emissions are harnessed on-site to generate useable CO2-free electricity that is fed directly back into a manufacturing process. Pulp and paper, lumber, refinery, cement and power plant operations are especially well-suited for waste heat recovery systems since they consume large amounts of electricity and maintain consistent waste heat streams with temperatures between 400° and 800°F.

A wave of new focus and project development activity has occurred as a result of rising energy costs, growing environmental concern and improvements to the ORC manufacturing process. Today’s new systems are modular, customizable, easily deployed and economical to the facilities that deploy them.

The rise of independent project developers and new financing models have also helped accelerate customer adoption of waste heat recovery systems. Project developers shoulder the responsibilities of designing, engineering, constructing and operating the ORC systems for their industrial customers. Additionally, project developers can offer their customers financing options that allow resource-constrained organizations to explore the myriad benefits of waste heat recovery projects. Popular financing options include the purchase of a complete “turn-key” power system, leasing the system or simply purchasing energy produced from a system installed at their site. The latter model, often referred to as the “PPA Model” (because the customer enters into a Power Purchase Agreement), relieves a company of capital expenditures and substantially shortens the sales cycle for new ORC systems. After all, who can say “no” to an offer of clean electricity, at a lower price than the utility can deliver, without any capital investment?

Facility managers, environmental experts and forward-thinking legislators are beginning to recognize waste heat recovery as a win-win clean energy solution. Now it is time to get Congress to pay attention to this renewable energy “hidden gem” and recognize waste heat as a renewable resource eligible for tax and environmental credits. By tapping into existing but unused energy sources, American companies can reduce energy spending, reduce carbon footprints and reduce dependence on non-renewable sources of energy. And that’s why waste heat is about to become a lot more relevant.

- Jason Gold is the Chief Executive Officer of KGRA Energy, LP, a developer of electricity generation projects that harvest waste heat to create clean, renewable energy

KGRA manages the design, construction and installation of organic Rankine cycle (ORC) waste heat recovery systems that create CO₂-free renewable energy for business and utility clients. KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable and produce power from waste heat sources deemed unsuitable for traditional cogeneration. KGRA enables pulp and paper, lumber, refinery, cement, datacenter, and power plant clients to convert waste heat to usable electricity, reduce energy costs, lower carbon footprints and create a sustainable future.

KGRA’s unique business solution involves the corporation owning and operating the heat recovery facilities for its customers. This allows the customer to enjoy all the benefits of recycling their wasted heat without any capital outlay. For customers that have a sufficient electric load, KGRA supplies them with low-cost power from the system. For those with smaller electric loads, KGRA will sell the produced power into the grid and provide the heat host a royalty. This system provides the customer with the ability to remain entirely and exclusively focused on their core business operations.

GE Energy and energy developer ECOS have announced they plan to demonstrate an innovative, industrial waste-heat recovery system that they say will dramatically increase the efficiency and output of a 7.2MW biogas power plant in the eastern Slovenia town of Lendava, near the border with Hungary.

GE’s new pilot Organic Rankine cycle (ORC) waste-heat recovery system for gas engines is designed to make onsite power plants that use natural gas, landfill gas and other waste gases more cost-attractive to build as countries install more cogeneration and renewable energy capacity to enhance energy security and lower regional emissions.

Executives from GE Energy and ECOS signed the new project agreement during a celebration of the fifth anniversary of GE’s European global research facility in Munich. GE’s new ORC system will allow ECOS to capture more waste heat created by its 7.2MW Bioplinarna Lendava biogas plant. The extra thermal power will be used to produce steam, which in turn will help generate enough electricity to support 300 European homes without using additional fuel.

“Our goal is to demonstrate that dramatic improvements in energy efficiency and output can be achieved in gas engine power plants through enhanced waste-heat recovery,” said ECOS director and owner Joze Pavlinjek. “We believe our collaboration with GE will help lead to the expanded use of cogeneration and renewable biogas solutions in support of European Union directives designed to improve regional energy security and combat global climate change.”

The pilot ORC system will be installed on one of the three GE ecomagination-certified Jenbacher J420 biogas engines that have powered ECOS’ Bioplinarna Lendava plant since June 2008. The ORC technology will boost the Jenbacher unit’s electrical efficiency by an estimated five per cent.

Landfill gas and other renewable biogas projects are among the prime candidates for ORC systems, especially in countries – including those in Europe – that offer high electricity feed-in tariffs.

“Countries around the world want to increase the use of renewable biofuels to meet their energy security and environmental requirements,” said Prady Iyyanki, ceo of GE’s Jenbacher gas engine business. “Pairing GE’s ORC technology with gas engines represents an important innovation in energy efficiency, allowing existing and future onsite power plants around the world to generate extra electricity without consuming additional fuel or creating more emissions.”

The ORC is so named for its use of an organic, high molecular mass fluid with a liquid-vapour phase change or boiling point than water to create steam for electricity generation. Because of this lower temperature, however, the choice of working fluid here is crucial. It is the thermodynamic characteristics of this fluid that determine how successful the process is.

Optimal characteristics of the ideal working fluid include: an insentropic saturation vapour curve; low freezing point, high stability temperature; high heat of vaporisation and density; low environmental impact; safety; good availability; and low cost.

Refrigerants and hydrocarbons are two commonly used working fluids. However, due to technical waste-heat recovery constraints, there had been few gas engine-based ORC applications.

GE says its new gas engine-ORC technology is a milestone for the global energy industry because for the first time all of the waste heat from an engine’s exhaust gas and cooling cycle can be fully captured and utilised to drive the power plant’s enhanced steam-creation process.

Thomas Frey, research scientist at the alternative energy lab of the global research centre, explains: “Thousands of megawatts of heat are wasted through stacks, chimneys and coolers into the atmosphere every day via refineries, steel mills, cement plants, furnaces and power plants. The latter have only an average electrical efficiency of 33 per cent in the US. The rest is thermal heat – a huge untapped source of energy. Experts have estimated that low-grade heat worth billions of dollars is wasted every year. Even a significant impact on carbon dioxide emissions could be made, if only a fraction of that heat could be recycled to save fossil fuels rather than rejecting it to the atmosphere. However, cost effective waste heat recovery systems for power production didn’t exist so far. This is exactly what motivated our waste heat recovery technology team at GE Global Research Munich to have a fresh look at an old technology: ORC. These systems have been known for more than a hundred years and operate very similarly to the conventional steam-based Rankine cycle – which is the basis of every conventional coal plant. The big difference is that ORCs don’t rely on high temperatures from burning fossil fuels but can use much lower heat input temperatures.”

In May GE also unveiled its organic regenerator (ORegen) waste heat recovery system developed with GE Oil & Gas. When coupled with a simple-cycle gas turbine, the ORegen system generates electricity from waste heat while consuming no additional fuel or water and avoiding associated carbon dioxide emissions.

Therefore, heat recovery now offers a great opportunity to conserve fuel by productively using waste energy to reduce overall plant energy consumption and simultaneously decrease carbon dioxide emissions. For example, when an ORegen unit is joined to GE Oil & Gas’ PGT25 gas turbine, it can provide up to an additional 25 per cent more power on top of the output of the turbine itself.

This breakthrough recently received GE’s ecomagination certification, in which a product is evaluated for its ability to significantly and measurably improve a customer’s environmental and operating performance. It’s the first ecomagination certified product to originate from GE’s global research centre in Munich.

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On 22 June 2011, a new set of measures for increased Energy Efficiency is proposed by the European Commission to fill the gap and put back the EU on track. This proposal for this new directive brings forward measures to step up Member States efforts to use energy more efficiently at all stages of the energy chain – from the transformation of energy and its distribution to its final consumption.

The Commission proposes simple but ambitious measures:

• Legal obligation to establish energy saving schemes in all Member States
• Public sector to lead by example
• Major energy savings for consumers

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The system, which is scheduled to come online in the summer of 2011, will recover waste heat from Weyerhaeuser’s biomass-based thermal drying system to generate 4.5 million kWh of CO2-free electricity per year. KGRA’s system will displace the equivalent of more than 9 million pounds of carbon dioxide each year.

The system from Lake Forest, Ill.-based KGRA Energy uses the organic Rankine cycle to recover waste heat from viable sources such as furnaces, boilers, kilns and combustion engine exhausts, converting it into usable CO2-free electricity. At the Weyerhaeuser lumber mill, heat will be recovered from a kiln where cut lumber enters the drying process.

KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable, providing the ability to produce power from smaller and lower temperature heat sources previously deemed unsuitable for standard cogeneration.

Click Here to see Original Story.

Waste heat recovery employs a process that has been around since the 1960s called the organic Rankine cycle (ORC), which easily integrates into existing manufacturing infrastructures. ORC units capture heat that is currently being released into the atmosphere and converts it into useable CO2-free electricity. This technology has a small footprint, approximately the size of a tractor trailer flatbed and interest in systems that use this energy generating skid is on the rise as companies look to maximize the efficiency of existing investments and infrastructures.

The market for waste heat recovery is virtually limitless. According to researchers at University California Berkley, the U.S. currently consumes about 100 quadrillion BTUs of energy per year. However, between 55 and 60 quadrillion BTUs are currently vented into the atmosphere as waste heat. With ORC technology these emissions are harnessed on-site to generate useable CO2-free electricity that is fed directly back into a manufacturing process. Pulp and paper, lumber, refinery, cement and power plant operations are especially well-suited for waste heat recovery systems since they consume large amounts of electricity and maintain consistent waste heat streams with temperatures between 400° and 800°F.

ORC employs environmentally benign refrigerants in a closed-loop system that turn waste heat into useable electricity. Given its relative simplicity, carbon neutrality and diminutive physical footprint, ORC is one of the most inexpensive sources of renewable power generation. Also, its high utilization rate (95%) far eclipses the 25-35% utilization rates seen in other renewable technologies, such as solar and wind.

A wave of new project development activity has occurred as a result of rising energy costs and growing environmental concern. Recent improvements in the ORC manufacturing process have made the systems modular, customizable, and easily deployed. Also, the rise of independent project managers has also hastened adoption; allowing customers to focus on energy savings while project managers design, engineer, construct and operate the plants.

Waste heat recovery delivers a win-win clean energy solution. By tapping into existing but unused energy sources companies reduce energy spending, reduce carbon footprints and reduce dependence on non-renewable sources of energy. And that’s why waste heat is about to become a lot more relevant.

Jason Gold is the Chief Executive Officer of KGRA Energy, LP, a developer of electricity generation projects that harvest waste heat to create clean, renewable energy

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Contact:  Katie Christopher

P: 202.974.5084 / C: 302.690.0355
christopherk@ruderfinn.com

KGRA ENERGY SECURES $2.75M COMMITMENT FROM THE COMMONWEALTH
OF PENNSYLVANIA FOR LOCAL WASTE HEAT RECOVERY INSTALLATION
Funding will Contribute to a 2 MW Project in Bradford County, PA

Lake Forest, IL (May 9, 2011) – Today, KGRA Energy, LP, a premier U.S. – based waste heat recovery developer, announced one of its project companies has received a $2.75M commitment from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania towards the installation of a 2 MW waste heat recovery system in Bradford County, PA. The secured funding, provided by Commonwealth Financing Authority and Pennsylvania Energy Development Authority, will enable KGRA to break ground on the project by Q4 of 2011. The installation will use organic Rankine cycle to recover waste heat and convert it into usable CO₂-free electricity at a Marcellus Shale based gas compression facility.

“KGRA is pleased to have been approved for the funding by the state of Pennsylvania and we are eager to break ground on this installation in Bradford County later this year,” said Carter Brown, KGRA Energy Chief Financial Officer. “This project demonstrates the state’s commitment to clean energy programs and will help elevate waste heat as an important part of the solution to curb emissions and reduce carbon footprints throughout Pennsylvania and across the country.”

KGRA Energy’s systems use the organic Rankine cycle to recover waste heat from viable sources, such as combustion engine exhausts, furnaces, boilers, and kilns, converting it into usable CO₂-free electricity, which lowers energy costs as well as heat pollution. KGRA projects are customized for the direct needs and specifications of each customer. The system that KGRA plans to install in Bradford County will harvest 848 degree waste heat released by compressors onsite at the facility, and will convert it into nearly 2MW of clean electricity. Additionally, local jobs will be created through the duration of the project.

About KGRA Energy LP

KGRA Energy LP is a premier developer of customized renewable energy power generation projects. The company manages the design, construction and installation of organic Rankine cycle waste heat recovery systems that create CO₂-free renewable energy for business and utility clients. KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable and produce power from waste heat sources deemed unsuitable for traditional cogeneration. KGRA enables pulp and paper, lumber, refinery, cement, power plant and midstream gas transmission clients to convert waste heat to usable electricity, reduce energy costs, lower carbon footprints and create a sustainable future. Visit www.kgraenergy.com for more information.

KGRA also hopes to finalize a project to produce 4 to 5 megawatts of electricity from the hot (887 degrees Fahrenheit) exhaust emanating from a cement factory. Another project will create electricity from the heat absorbed from liquid hydrocarbons in distillation towers at refineries.

This week, KGRA signed a deal to build an 800-kilowatt waste heat recovery system at Weyerhauser’s Greenville, North Carolina plant.

“The amount of energy being wasted is staggering,” said Gold.

The company embodies two trends in renewables. First, there’s a growing interest in harvesting waste heat. The U.S. consumes 100 quads, or quadrillion BTUs, of energy a year, and 55 to 60 quads get dissipated as waste heat, according to research conducted at UC Berkeley. The heat emanating from car engines, notebook bricks and industrial ovens is really just energy purchased, but not used efficiently, by someone.

As an added bonus, power generated from waste heat tends to mimic baseline power, unlike the intermittent nature of wind or solar power. As long as the factory hums along, power is generated.

“This is utility-grade power,” Gold said. “24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.”

The power figures above, Gold added, are for net power produced. KGRA deducts the power required for its own equipment from the total.

Second, it’s the developer business model. KGRA, he emphasized, is a developer and not a manufacturer. The company essentially finds opportunities, tries to estimate the costs and output of a potential projects, and then signs the appropriate offtake agreements, pretty much like your typical solar developer. The company is both brand- and technology-agnostic, meaning that it will install heat recovery systems from General Electric, Ormat, Pratt & Whitney or whomever might work best in the given circumstances.

Structuring the deal so the end-user buys kilowatts instead of capital equipment, in general, helps eliminate the obstacles to acceptance. (Traditionally, industrialists bought the equipment and the vendor and contractor were often associated with the terms of the deal.) Most of the time, the end-user consumes all of the energy. If excess exists, it can be delivered to third parties via the grid. In some states, renewable credits bolster the price.

There’s also an efficiency play here. Capturing waste heat and converting it to electricity reduces overall power consumption. Air conditioners can be turned down and onsite power generation reduces demand for power on the grid. At the oil refinery mentioned above, large electrical fans are employed to get rid of the heat. Because of the power conservation potential, some states and utilities will provide credits and rebates to waste heat projects, similar to how some utilities are subsidizing building retrofits and ice air conditioners under the guise of reducing peak power.

While KGRA will work with different technologies, the company primarily concentrates on organic Rankine cycle (ORC) machinery. In ORC waste heat recovery, captured heat is used to turn an organic liquid into vapor. The vapor then cranks a turbine. The key is that the vapor boils at a far lower temperature than water. ORC plants can operate with exhaust heat at 500 to 800 degrees Fahrenheit. Waste heat systems that rely on steam need heat in the 800-degrees-Fahrenheit-and-above range.

A total of 150 large-scale ORC plants have been erected in Europe and 25 have been launched in the U.S. “It is beyond a shadow of a doubt that it [ORC] works,” Gold emphasized.

Whether a plant is appropriate for waste heat depends on a variety of factors and circumstances. How much exhaust does a plant produce and what is the temperature? Does power cost quite a bit or very little? How much will the end-user consume? Overall, though, ORC equipment in positive circumstances can generate power for a capital cost of $3.50 a watt.

Some companies, such as Phononic Devices and Alphabet Energy, are developing semiconductors that can convert heat directly into electricity, no turbine needed. The simplicity will lower the capital costs to $1 a watt, says Alphabet. But these chips, often relying on relatively new materials like silicon nanowires, tend to be in the experimental phase.

Waste heat doesn’t enjoy the same level of support of subsidies as wind or solar, but that could change. For one thing, it’s a competitive, rapidly growing field. Last year, the VC firm Westly Group experienced three IPOs: one was waste heat specialist China Recycling Energy Corp. Leaders in Washington also probably like the concept. Arun Majumdar, the director of ARPA-E, was the one who gave me those BTU figures noted above. He also conducted the research behind Alphabet Energy. Majumdar, of course, worked with Energy Secretary Steve Chu at Lawrence Berkeley Labs, which has been the epicenter of efficiency research for years.

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Contact:  Katie Christopher

P: 202.974.5084 / C: 302.690.0355
christopherk@ruderfinn.com

KGRA ENERGY SECURES LONG TERM CONTRACT
WITH WEYERHAEUSER COMPANY

800 kW Waste Heat Recovery System Slated for Delivery in Q3 2011

Lake Forest, IL (April 25, 2011) — KGRA Energy LP, a premier U.S.-based waste heat recovery developer, announced today that it has signed a contract with Weyerhaeuser Company (NYSE: WY), one of the world’s largest forest products companies. KGRA’s subsidiary Ayden HTP Partners LLC will design and construct the 800kW waste heat recovery system at Weyerhaeuser’s Greenville, NC lumber mill. The system, which is scheduled to come online in the summer of 2011, will recover waste heat from Weyerhaeuser’s biomass-based thermal drying system to generate 4.5 million kWh of CO₂-free electricity per year. KGRA’s system will displace the equivalent of more than 9 million pounds of carbon dioxide each year.

“KGRA is pleased to be selected by Weyerhaeuser, a leader in innovation and corporate sustainability, as a partner on this important waste heat recovery project,” said Jason Gold, KGRA Energy Chief Executive Officer. “We look forward to expanding our relationship with Weyerhaeuser as the organization identifies ways to lower energy costs and reduce its carbon footprint at its forest products facilities across the country.”

“We are pleased to be working with KGRA Energy and its partner TAS Energy on this project,” said John Ryan, Region Energy Manager at Weyerhaeuser. “The technology the company uses is designed to produce clean energy, while reducing our emissions and lowering the plant’s electricity bill.”

KGRA Energy’s system uses the organic Rankine cycle to recover waste heat from viable sources, such as combustion engine exhausts, furnaces, boilers, and kilns, converting it into usable CO₂-free electricity, which lowers energy costs as well as heat pollution. KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable, providing the ability to produce power from smaller and lower-temperature heat sources previously deemed unsuitable for standard cogeneration. KGRA projects are customized for the direct needs and specifications of each customer. At the Weyerhaeuser lumber mill, heat will be recovered from a kiln where cut lumber enters the drying process.

The organic Rankine cycle equipment that will be installed in Weyerhaeuser’s Greenville, NC lumber mill will be made in America. Additionally, the project is expected to create 19.7 American jobs throughout the development, construction and installation process.

Weyerhaeuser and Ayden HTP Partners LLC, a joint-venture between KGRA Energy and the ORC equipment supplier, TAS Energy LLC, a subsidiary of Turbine Air Systems, LTD, completed the agreement in March 2011. Installation of the project is expected to begin in June and the plant intends to be operational by the end of July 2011.

About KGRA Energy LP

KGRA Energy LP is a premier developer of customized renewable energy power generation projects. The company manages the design, construction and installation of organic Rankine cycle waste heat recovery systems that create CO₂-free renewable energy for business and utility clients. KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable and produce power from waste heat sources deemed unsuitable for traditional cogeneration. KGRA enables pulp and paper, lumber, refinery, cement and power plant clients to convert waste heat to usable electricity, reduce energy costs, lower carbon footprints and create a sustainable future. Visit www.kgraenergy.com for more information.

About Weyerhaeuser Company

Weyerhaeuser Company, one of the world’s largest forest products companies, began operations in 1900. We grow and harvest trees, build homes and make a range of forest products essential to everyday lives. We manage our timberland on a sustainable basis in compliance with internationally recognized forestry standards. At the end of 2010, we employed approximately 14,000 employees in 10 countries. We have customers worldwide and generated $6.6 billion in sales in 2010. Our stock trades on the New York Stock exchange under the symbol WY. Additional information about us is available at www.weyerhaeuser.com.

About TAS Energy

TAS Energy Inc. is a technology company providing clean economic power solutions by focusing on the energy efficiency and renewable energy markets. TAS designs and manufactures modular energy conversion and cooling systems for the power generation industry; district, commercial and industrial process cooling; mission critical; and the renewable energy sector. TAS specializes in high efficiency standard product designs optimized for high life cycle return performance. Its product capabilities include geothermal and industrial waste heat power generation solutions, gas fired generation augmentation, chilled water systems, modular data centers and clean heat and power on-site energy systems. More can be learned at http://www.tas.com/.

In Brisbane, Australia, a 240-kW ORC unit at a timber plant will soon harvest heat from an existing biomass burner and generate electricity to power kilns for drying lumber. Similar ORC systems are becoming killer add-ons for other heat-based renewable energy plants, including concentrating solar and utility-scale geothermal systems.

“People are realizing now that, if you throw away heat, you’re throwing away money,” said David Paul, international business development manager for Pratt & Whitney, which designed the system for the Gympie Timber Company in Australia.

Typical geothermal systems generate electricity when water-based steam at high temperatures powers turbines. An ORC system uses a different fluid, such as thermal oil or silicon-based oil, which powers turbines at lower temperatures than those required for steam. ORC power plants have been known to generate power from geothermal sources with temperatures as low as 73.3ºC (165ºF) in Alaska. Utility-scale geothermal plants with steam turbines typically require water temperatures in excess of 350ºF.

The ability to use lower temperature fluids make the ORC systems ideal for harvesting heat from industrial exhaust systems. They are typically configured with the following components:

• Heat source – This can be a geothermal water well, exhaust from an industrial facility, or heat from a biomass furnace or concentrating solar power system.
• Thermal oil – This intermediary component transfers heat from the source to the ORC unit.
• Rankine cycle – Oil from the thermal oil system warms oil in the ORC unit, creating temperatures high enough to power a turbine.

Pratt & Whitney is among the growing number of companies trying to introduce ORC en mass to the United States market. ORC systems have been generating heat and electricity with woody biomass sources for 20 years overseas. Europeans have embraced combined heat and power (CHP) ORC plants (such as the one in Australia) because they can operate with at to 85 percent efficiencies.

“When you look at the stacks on a nuclear plant or coal plant, they’re releasing all that excess heat into the atmosphere, so they’re only 20 to 30% efficient,” said Bob Larson, CEO of Pennsylvania-based 1st Renewable Energy Technologies. “An ORC captures that excess heat, making 85% efficiencies possible.”

Europe has 120 to 150 ORC CHP plants with capacities of multiple megawatts. Many use waste wood as biomass feed sources. Larson said environmental concerns, coupled with high fuel costs, jump-started Europe’s investments in ORC plants in the 1980s. His company has formed a partnership with Maxxtech AG, one of Europe’s leading ORC manufacturers, to target the American market, where cement plants and other industrial facilities have been capturing waste heat for years.

Paul said Pratt & Whitney has received a notable increase in inquiries about ORCs as waste heat has become a hot topic over the past year. The company, a division of United Technologies, recently sold a unit to the city of Albany, New York. Similar systems are also marketed by geothermal heavyweight Ormat Technologies Inc.

Challenges remain in expanding ORC use in the United States, especially when retrofitting at industrial plants. In many configurations, the ORC itself is only 50% of the total installation costs, which include heat transfer equipment and condensers to cool the systems.

“A lot of times there have to be incentives in place [to make the economics work],” Paul said.

Incentive programs have helped his company’s ORC business expand to in India, Thailand and Indonesia.

Pratt & Whitney spokesman Bryan Kidder said its systems run $1,000 to $2,000 per kW. Larson said his CHP ORC systems can cost $925 kW compared to $5,000 to $7,000 per kW for other forms of renewable energy.

Larson envisions a time when Americans might install relatively small (2 to 5 MW) distributed ORC plants that provide heat and power to regional districts while operating independently of large transmission lines. He believes smaller, distributed plants are more efficient and could take advantage of ORC technology more sustainably.

“There’s talk about 50 MW biomass plants in the U.S., but you kind of shoot yourself in the foot if you need to truck in biomass from 100 miles out just to fuel [the plant],” he said. “Smaller plants allow for more sustainable forestry.”

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The $750,000 Grant will support a waste-heat-to-power project connected to a natural gas gathering station in Bradford County – an active area for Marcellus Shale operators.

(LAKE FOREST, IL) October 25, 2010 – KGRA Energy Corporation has received a $750,000 grant from the State of Pennsylvania’s Department of Environmental Protection towards the construction of a waste heat-to-power project.

The cogeneration facility will be located in Bradford County, PA and will harvest the heat from reciprocating engines at a natural gas compression station currently under construction by a major US natural gas company. It will produce approximately 1.26MW of clean, renewable electricity from a generator linked to an organic Rankine cycle power system.

The grant, administered by the Pennsylvania Energy Development Authority, is designed to drive the advanced and renewable energy technology marketplace and further the implementation of energy efficient technologies. Funding for the grant was provided by three sources including: the sate Growing Greener II funds, the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act, and Duquesne Light Settlement Fund.

“We are honored to be among this select group of renewable energy companies recognized by the State of Pennsylvania as having projects that will advance its goals of innovation, job creation, and clean energy production,” stated Jason Gold, KGRA’s Chief Executive Officer.

“This project, which will harness exhaust heat from reciprocating engines is one of the first of its kind and will open the door to many more megawatts of clean renewable power in the Marcellus Shale area.”

With an uptime ratio of 95%, KGRA’s facility is estimated to produce 10 million kilowatt-hours of emission-free electricity per year – displacing the equivalent of over 16 million lbs. of carbon dioxide and producing enough electricity for over 900 residences – all from the wasted exhaust heat from gas-powered engines.

The full press release from Governor Edward G. Rendell’s office can be found here http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/governor-rendell-announces-40-innovative-energy-projects-to-create-1400-jobs-calls-for-higher-solar-standards-to-spur-additional-job-growth-101988018.html

About KGRA Energy Corporation:

KGRA Energy is a developer of renewable energy power generation projects that harness waste heat to create clean, renewable energy. The Company uses organic Rankine cycle and where relevant, steam-based power modules to harvest heat from engines, turbines, furnaces, and other heat sources to create renewable electricity.

Because KGRA’s systems are modular and scalable, it can produce power from heat sources traditionally served by steam cogeneration and from smaller and lower-temperature heat sources unsuitable for standard cogeneration.

KGRA is a client company of the Houston Technology Center.

For more information please contact:

KGRA Energy Corporation
Jill Jenson – Media Coordinator
917-652-6605
jill@kgraenergy.com
info@kgraenergy.com
www.kgraenergy.com

Today 36 industrial manufacturers, developers, waste heat technology manufacturers, environmental advocates and major trade associations sent the Leadership of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate the below letter urging the inclusion of waste heat in any energy tax package that comes to a vote.

Meetings with the staffers of Senators and Representatives specifically concerned about our nation’s energy crisis yield clear support for appropriate recognition of waste heat as a zero emission resource, as well as often confusion that it has not yet been recognized.

We are confident, once more Members become familiar with waste heat, there will be no hesitation to ensure its development across our country. Educating Members of Congress who are working on numerous initiatives to make our country stronger is a challenge.

This letter helps solidify and provide tangible examples of support for waste heat. If your organization or company would like to join this support letter for future use, please email us! info@heatispower.org

The letter was sent to: Senators Reid, McConnell, Bingaman, Murkowski, Baucus and Grassley as well as Representatives Pelosi, Boehner, Levin, Camp.

September 27, 2010

The Honorable Max Baucus The Honorable Charles E. Grassley
Senate Finance Committee- SD 219 Senate Finance Committee SD-219
Washington, D.C. 20510 Washington, D.C. 20510

Dear Chairman Baucus and Ranking Member Grassley:
Today’s manufacturing and oil and gas sectors emit a largely unknown, untapped form of renewable energy from nearly all facilities currently in operation. This valuable resource is more commonly known as waste heat, an inherent byproduct of industrial and oil and gas processes that is typically released into the atmosphere. Luckily, through American innovation, advanced technology is capable of generating zero-emission electricity from the majority of our country’s waste heat. If harnessed, waste heat will provide more clean energy, increase manufacturing competitiveness by providing emission-free power from a free fuel source, and create new jobs in the U.S. American manufacturers are producing technology to convert this waste heat into zero-emission electricity using greater than 90% U.S. manufactured products. No country in the world has yet to become a major exporter of this technology, leaving the potential for U.S. leadership to create hundreds of thousands of new, sustained American manufacturing jobs.

Just as traditional renewables were not harnessed on a wide scale until federal incentives were created for development, so too are equal tax incentives needed to see this zero carbon resource developed.

An analysis using DOE and EIA data by Recycled Energy Development shows that, once in operation, waste heat to electricity delivers power at less than $80/mwh (which is lower than any other new generation, including coal). However, upfront capital costs for the emerging technology are still high and the technology is not widely deployed, which ultimately hinders commercial financing.

A 30% investment tax credit under section 48 and recognition of waste heat as a zero-carbon resource under section 45 is necessary to see the country’s waste heat resources developed. Representatives Berkley, Paul, Tonko, and Inslee introduced H.R.5977 with these provisions July 29, 2010 as the Heat is Power Act.

We must not delay in appropriately recognizing waste heat as a zero-carbon resource under sections 45 and 48. We urge you to include this provision in any applicable forthcoming legislation.

Sincerely,
Associations
American Iron and Steel Institute
International District Energy Association
U.S. Clean Heat & Power Association
TX CHP Initiative
Environmental Defense Fund
American Coke and Coal Chemicals Institute
Clean Economy Network
Companies
Smardt Chillers- 41 States (New York HQ)
Guardian Industries- 23 States (Michigan)
Nucor Steel- 22 States (North Carolina)
ArcelorMittal USA- 12 States (Indiana/Illinois)
GE Energy- 9 States (Georgia)
Solar Turbines- 7 States (California)
Recycled Energy Development- 6 States (IL)
AK Steel Corporation- 4 States (Ohio)
Verdeo Group, Inc- 3 States (D.C.)
Infastech- 2 States (Iowa)
KGRA- 2 States (Illinois)
Calnetix- California
Alphabet Energy- California
Waste Heat Solutions- California
Barber-Nichols, Inc- Colorado
Primary Energy Recycling Corp- Illinois
Illinois Ventures- Illinois
Ormat Technologies, Inc- Nevada
ElectraTherm- Nevada
Echogen Power Systems- Ohio
SeventySix Capital- Pennsylvania
Element Partners- Pennsylvania
SunCoke Energy, Inc- Tennessee
TAS Energy- Texas
Gulf Coast Green Energy- Texas
Trinity Green Services- Texas
Distributed Energy Financial Group- Texas
Integral Power- Texas
RobustEnergy LLC- Texas

ORGANIC rankine cycle analysis

Figure 1 shows a basic ORC coupled as a waste heat recovery cycle to a stationary engine. The exhaust from the engine is assumed to be routed through the evaporator, where heat transfer occurs between the exhaust stream and the organic working fluid. A counterflow heat exchanger (evaporator) configuration is considered to maximize heat transfer between the exhaust and the organic fluid. Thermodynamically, this is a preferred configuration because the temperature difference between the hot fluid and the cold fluid is minimized, reducing exergy destruction. The heated organic fluid then is expanded in a turbine, heat is rejected to the ambient in the condenser, and the cooled working fluid is pumped back into the evaporator.

An important factor that affects the efficiency of an ORC is the selection of the organic working fluid. The working fluid must be selected carefully on the basis of safety and technical feasibility. A good working fluid should have low toxicity, good material compatibility and fluid stability limits, and low flammability, corrosion, and fouling characteristics. Refrigerants are good candidates for ORC applications as a result of their low toxicity characteristics. Organic fluids can be classified as dry, wet, and isentropic, depending on the slope of the saturation curve in the T-s diagram (Figure 2). On a T-s diagram, a dry fluid has a positive slope, a wet fluid has a negative slope, and an isentropic fluid has infinitely large slopes. Dry and isentropic fluids show better thermal efficiencies than wet fluids. One of the reasons for this is that dry and isentropic fluids do not condense after the fluid goes through the turbine, as opposed to wet fluids. For the case presented, R113, which is a dry fluid, was selected as the working fluid because it has been shown to be a good candidate for ORC applications.¹ Further, it is assumed that waste heat from the engine will be used to heat the organic fluid from subcooled liquid to saturated vapor. This condition was preset since previous studies have reported that dry organic fluids do not need to be superheated.²

Figure 1. Schematic of an engine-ORC configuration

Figure 2. Schematic representation of isentropic, wet, and dry fluids

COMBINED ENGINE-ORC CONFIGURATION

As was mentioned above, exhaust waste heat recovery from stationary engines using ORC has the potential to increase fuel conversion efficiency and reduce break specific emissions. The fuel conversion efficiency of the engine,, and the engine-ORC configuration, , can be estimated as follows:

where is the lower heating value of the fuel, is the mass of fuel, and and are the engine power and ORC power, respectively.

Therefore, it is clear that exhaust WHR using an ORC results in higher power with the same fuel energy input into the system.

Figure 3 illustrates the engine efficiency of a dual fuel (diesel pilot-ignited natural gas fired) engine* (from experiments³), the combined engine-ORC efficiency (predicted from ORC simulation), and the percentage of increase between the two cases at representative diesel pilot injection timings of 20°, 40°, and 60° BTDC (before top dead center) for a single-cylinder Caterpillar 3401 (1Y SCOTE) engine with simulated turbocharging operating at half load (21 kW power). From this figure, it can be seen that using a combined engine-ORC configuration, the thermal efficiency can be incremented by approximately 10 to 13 percent of the baseline values for all injection timings.

An important parameter that affects the combined engine-ORC system performance is the pinch point temperature difference (PPTD), which is defined as the difference between the exhaust gas temperature and the temperature at which the organic fluid first begins to vaporize (Figure 4). This is the smallest temperature difference in the evaporator (ORC heat exchanger), and it defines the performance limits of the ORC heat exchanger. The T-∆H diagram used for the pinch point analysis is illustrated in Figure 4. The heat transfer rate across the ORC heat exchanger is proportional to the PPTD. As the PPTD increases, the mass flow rate of the organic fluid decreases, and this results in poor utilization of the exhaust energy. To accomplish heat transfer across smaller PPTD values, larger heat exchanger areas are required. This leads to larger and more expensive heat exchangers. However, the exergy efficiency of heat transfer across a smaller temperature difference is much higher (i.e., this leads to lower exergy destruction). Therefore, there is a clear cost versus efficiency trade-off in selecting evaporators in ORC design.

Another important parameter that affects the performance of the exhaust waste heat recovery using an ORC is the evaporator temperature and evaporator effectiveness. This temperature has to be selected properly to avoid condensation of water in the evaporator. It is important to prevent water condensation to reduce the potential for corrosion in the evaporator tubing. In general, the first and second law efficiencies of an ORC increase with the increment of the evaporator temperature, which will also increase the overall performance of the combined engine-ORC system. Regarding the evaporator effectiveness, it is clear that as the evaporator effectiveness increases, the PPTD decreases. These trends also indicate that higher exergy efficiencies are possible by choosing higher evaporator effectiveness values. However, as was discussed above, this entails a higher cost as a result of the fact that larger evaporators are needed to facilitate heat transfer across smaller temperature differences. However, favoring lower evaporator effectiveness presents a practical problem of water condensation in the evaporator tubing. Therefore, a balance point has to be found between the evaporator temperature and the temperature at which condensation will not be present.

Figure 3. Engine and combined engine-ORC efficiencies at various injection timings

Figure 4. T-∆H diagram used for the pinch point analysis in the evaporator

The fuel conversion efficiency of stationary power engines can be improved by using organic Rankine cycles to recover the exhaust waste heat. The operation of a combined engine-ORC system yields a fuel conversion efficiency improvement of the order of 10 to 15 percent.

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Chicago, IL, Houston, TX and Short Hills, NJ, February 24, 2010 – KGRA Energy Corporation today announced that it has been chosen by AlwaysOn as one of the GoingGreen East Top 50 winners. Inclusion in the GoingGreen East 50 signifies leadership amongst its peers and game-changing approaches and technologies that are likely to disrupt existing markets and entrenched players. KGRA was specially selected by the AlwaysOn editorial team and industry experts spanning the globe based on a set of five criteria: innovation, market potential, commercialization, stakeholder value, and media buzz.

KGRA and the GoingGreen East Top 50 companies will be honored at AlwaysOn’s GoingGreen East event on March 8th, 2010, at the Four Seasons Hotel in Boston, MA.

This two-and-a-half-day executive event features CEO presentations and high-level debates on the most promising emerging green technologies and new entrepreneurial opportunities

“The GoingGreen East Top 50 winners have excelled in key strategic areas in the global clean energy technology markets,” said Tony Perkins, founder and CEO of AlwaysOn. “We congratulate them for their success in introducing new tools, services, and systems that are driving the next phase of greentech innovation and transforming the biggest industries on earth.”

The GoingGreen East 50 winners were selected from among hundreds of other technology companies nominated by investors, bankers, journalists and industry insiders. The AlwaysOn editorial team conducted a rigorous three-month selection process to finalize the 2010 list.

“KGRA is honored to be among the companies chosen for this year’s GoingGreen list. The screening criteria were quite rigorous and the caliber of both our competition and colleagues on the list is exceptional. We are both grateful for the opportunity AlwaysOn and KPMG have given us and humbled by the magnitude of the opportunity which lies ahead for those of us pursuing this emerging market opportunity.”

A full list of all the GoingGreen East Top 50 winners can be found on the AlwaysOn website at:

http://alwayson.goingon.com/permalink/post/34471

About KGRA Energy Corp

KGRA Energy Corporation develops small-scale, modular power generation assets using field-proven equipment and a rapid deployment method.

KGRA avoids the costs and risks associated with drilling for its fuel by leveraging the heat associated with the extraction, distribution, processing, and burning of hydrocarbons to produce power. Combining the data from existing reservoirs and sites with recent advancements in low-temperature geothermal power production equipment, KGRA employs a fully financed solution to provide clean and renewable energy to the oil and gas industry.

KGRA does not require any investment on behalf of its customers; it designs, builds, owns, operates, and maintains its energy generation facilities. Moreover, the Company sells produced electricity to operators under a long-term, fixed-price contract that will save them money and provide stability to their income statement. Where appropriate, excess power generated can be sold back into the grid.

About AlwaysOn

AlwaysOn is the leading business media brand networking the Global Silicon Valley. AlwaysOn helped ignite the social media revolution in early 2003 when it launched the AlwaysOn network. In 2004, it became the first media brand to socially network its online readers and event attendees. AlwaysOn’s preeminent executive event series includes the Summit at Stanford, OnMedia, OnHollywood, OnDC, OnDemand, Venture Summit Silicon Valley, Venture Summit East, GoingGreen, GoingGreen East, and GoingGreen Europe. The AlwaysOn network and live event series continue to lead the industry by empowering its readers, event participants, sponsors, and advertisers like no other media brand.

Then too, the region wonders how “green,” as it’s currently defined, will mix with its notorious rust. Every dollar of GDP created in Ohio requires the emission of 37 percent more greenhouse gases than the US average, which will make it hard to compete in a green system. Wind and solar, which make sense in the West and on the coasts, are a tough sell in the Midwest, with its relatively placid, gray skies. Even green jobs, which have made a splash elsewhere, cannot keep up with the state’s hemorrhaging employment rates. When the Obama administration doled out tax credits for jobs in “advanced energy manufacturing” in early January, Ohio got seven projects–more than most other states. But these are minuscule compared with the nearly 1,200 work sites and almost 107,000 manufacturing jobs the state has lost in the past two years.

The Midwest and the South do have an abundant supply of untapped, low-cost, low-carbon power–it just hasn’t been defined as green yet. The solution to some of the woes of nineteen of these states can be found right in their high-carbon infrastructures: old manufacturing plants, municipalities and agricultural produce waste energy that can be profitably “recycled” onto the grid to create power as clean as that from solar and wind but far cheaper. In fact, energy now lost as steam and gases by the region’s manufacturing plants, as well as municipal and agricultural waste, could create as much energy as sixty-nine nuclear power plants, according to figures commissioned by the Environmental Protection Agency. This power could strengthen the region’s electrical grid and preserve jobs by making local manufacturing plants more economically stable, while making the region a leader in greener technology. But in order to accomplish this, and steer that potential through the maze of financial and regulatory barriers that currently encourage waste, we’ll need to create a federal regional stimulus program, a Clean Power Authority somewhat analogous to the Tennessee Valley Authority.

Smokestacks are the Pyramids of the Rust Belt, both product and symbol of how we built our modern economy on cheap energy. “Fly” over the state of Ohio on Google Earth and you’ll find smokestacks ringing its old industrial cities and towns. They stretch high above the 1,600-degree furnaces at Toledo’s Libbey Glass. Not far from downtown Cleveland, the massive ArcelorMittal steel mill injects steam and excess heat into the sky in long plumes. In Cincinnati, puffs of vapor hover above the chemical manufacturer Cognis Corporation.

Ohio’s ubiquitous smokestacks are a reminder that the state was the Silicon Valley of its time: a fountain of innovation that created the rubber tire industry, the process for making aluminum, even the world’s first industrial park and led the way in aviation and oil refining. “This region gave birth to the whole twentieth century,” observes Richard Stuebi, a fellow at the Cleveland Foundation, “and now it’s being discarded.”

Despite having a highly trained workforce, the state has a hard time attracting venture capital for new industry. Ohio rustles up only $3 in venture funding for every $1,000 of gross state product it produces, while the US average is $12. (Innovation leaders like Massachusetts and California get more than $70.)

All those smokestacks, though, hold the potential for a lower-carbon renaissance. Outfit them to use wasted steam, heat, gases or even pressure to generate power, and the three plants mentioned above could produce between 145 and 285 megawatts of additional generation–roughly as much as a coal-fired power plant–but without adding any new carbon to the air, according to analysis by Recycled Energy Development, an Illinois company. In fact, Ohio has a massive bank account of steam and energy that could be used to generate as much electricity as eight nuclear power plants, according to figures commissioned by the EPA. Ohio industry has installed so little cogeneration equipment to put its wasted energy to use that it recovers less than 1 percent of its potential. Locals joke that the state’s unused reserves make it the “Saudi Arabia of cogen.”

Adding this potential energy to the grid is much cheaper than building conventional power plants. According to estimates by Oak Ridge National Laboratory, recycled generation can be built for about $1,500 per kilowatt–less than half the cost of central generators that run on coal.

Even though it doesn’t add new carbon to the atmosphere, recycling steam from smokestacks feels more “gray” than “green” to most people. Gray electricity would make a powerful booster for a green grid, however, because it can add large amounts of new, low-carbon power to the mix more quickly and cheaply than, say, investing in solar roofs. In East Chicago, Indiana, for example, two steel mills recycled 190 megawatts of waste energy in 2005. That same year their electrical output was roughly equal to that of all the solar photovoltaic power produced in the United States–and that was only for these two plants. According to Recycled Energy Development, recycling waste from just fifty-nine of Ohio’s larger manufacturers could yield 3.3 gigawatts of generation–equivalent to more than three nuclear plants.

Installing gray power also reduces costs for manufacturers. An article in The Atlantic reported that energy recycling saves $100 million a year in energy costs at one of these plants. In addition, the plants are able to continue working during summer electricity shortages and brownouts that shut down competitors. These savings enhance the company’s bottom line and suggest that state policy-makers could adopt gray power as an aggressive strategy to retain local jobs. Traditionally, state officials have reduced taxes to keep employers, but that is nearly at an end: in Ohio, manufacturers spend seven times more on energy than they do on taxes. Sam Randazzo of Industrial Energy Users-Ohio points out that few Ohio companies are really “competing” against Chinese companies on the price of, say, widgets. Instead, they’re competing for investment capital and operating expenses within their multinational corporate family. Local officials have to help local plants make the case that they need money to make improvements and continue to operate. Enabling plants to produce and sell gray power is one way to bolster their performance.

Gray power delivers benefits outside factory gates that could dramatically improve Ohio’s economy and environment. A recent report from Policy Matters Ohio estimates that recycling 7.7 gigawatts of generation would require a $10.5 billion investment in the state. This would pay for itself within three years in energy savings of $2.9 billion a year. Crucially, it would create 40,000 green jobs. The environmental benefits would be significant: replacing coal-fired power with recycled power would reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 36 million metric tons (equivalent to taking 6.6 million cars off the road).

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West Virginia’s Kanawha River Valley is a gritty collection of slag piles, coal mounds and sooty mine shafts. It is also a showcase for clean energy. In the unincorporated town of Alloy, a 72-year-old silicon smelter owned by West Virginia Alloys is getting a $75 million heat recycling system. If it delivers what it promises, it will produce as much electricity as $300 million worth of giant windmills or $2.8 billion in solar panels–exclusive of energy credits.

Is it possible that in their hunt for low-carbon energy, environmentalists are barking up the wrong trees? Sun and wind power are indeed clean but expensive, in part because the sun doesn’t always shine and the wind doesn’t always blow. For its modest capital outlay the Alloy project is supposed to produce 357 million kilowatt-hours of juice per year. Solar cells (at least if installed in West Virginia) would pay a much lower dividend per dollar invested.

The Alloy project is the brainchild of Thomas and Sean Casten, the father and son duo who run Recycled Energy Development in Westmont, Ill. In early 2010 RED hopes to fire up a turbine that will capture the 1,500-Fahrenheit-degree heat coming off the silicon plant’s five arc furnaces and feed that electricity in a roundabout way back into the factory. West Virginia Alloys makes more silicon, 72,000 tons annually, than any other single site in the world, selling the glinty metal to manufacturers of everything from cosmetics to computer chips. This plant is already the lowest-cost producer of silicon in the world and, with the Castens’ technology, will save an additional 37% on its energy bills, which account for one-third of its operating costs.

The idea that you can wring value out of waste heat has a long history. Thomas Edison sold heat from the exhaust of the world’s first power plant on Pearl Street in Manhattan, using it to warm nearby buildings. You do the same sort of thing when you turn on a car heater. Space heating is the easy application for industrial waste heat. But with some engineering finesse the discarded Btu can also be used to turn turbines that produce high-quality electric energy.

Why isn’t more of this country’s industrial waste heat put to use? The space heating application is geographically limited; customers have to be within several miles of the heat source. As for dynamos running on scrap heat: Cheap energy and grid regulations have discouraged such projects. But now the “gray power” concept is back on the table. “We’re at the start of something that should have been done long ago,” says Tom Casten, 65, RED’s chairman. Sean, 37, is chief executive.

The Castens are armed with Department of Energy studies that suggest the U.S. could reduce its CO2 emissions by 20%, the equivalent of taking all the cars and light trucks off the road, by recycling industrial waste heat and building smaller fossil-fuel “cogeneration” plants sized to provide enough by-product heat for each factory or office park. Tom Casten goes even further, envisioning small power plants spread out across America for homes and businesses. By capturing waste heat, these power plants would operate at above 90% efficiency, Casten says, compared with the current U.S. power grid that operates at 33%, the same as it did 50 years ago.

Doubters exist on the pragmatics of cogeneration of heat and electricity for the general population. “That’s a little bit of a fairy tale, but it does hold a grain of truth,” says John Parsons, executive director for mit’s Center for Energy & Environmental Policy Research. Parsons says cogeneration could work for high-density apartment blocks but isn’t reasonable for single-family homes.

Working against electricity production from waste heat is the fact that most states still have utility-friendly laws that prohibit nonutilities from selling power directly to others without going through the grid. Bilateral agreements to buy and sell power can be done across the grid, but producers such as RED must surrender roughly a third of the selling price to a utility for transmission fees, even if it’s just across the street. New legislation that democratizes the world of power supply is bubbling up, however. Two years ago New Jersey began, on a limited basis, allowing commercial neighbors to sell power to one another outside of the grid. “We will either move the world to local generation or we will suffer the consequences of global warming,” says Tom Casten.

The Castens founded RED in 2006 after seeing two similar, and lucrative, companies the elder Casten helped develop, Trigen Energy and Primary Energy, bought out from under him. He took Trigen public in 1994 on the New York Stock Exchange, where it traded until France’s Suez launched a hostile takeover bid in 1999 that secured the 47% of Trigen it didn’t already own for $138 million. Trigen operated small turbine power plants that supplied power and waste heat to customers for winter warmth and hot water. Casten’s time at Primary Energy, which pursued the same business as RED, ended when the company’s equity backers sold the company to Canada’s Epcor in 2006 for $330 million. Casten did well on those deals but felt he never got to see either to the heights he’d envisioned. He wants to take RED public one day, while still maintaining control.

To that end, he’s lured Boston’s Denham Capital as a partner to fund his projects without sacrificing any equity in RED. Denham, which manages $4.3 billion from investors including Bill Gates and Harvard University, will share dividends in the projects with RED and expects a return in the 15%-to-20% range, according to Riaz Siddiqi, a Denham managing partner. “It’s been fascinating, over the years, to watch Tom be so faithful to his beliefs on efficiency and how he makes money on that,” Siddiqi says. Sean Casten brings his own experience as a trained molecular engineer and clean-energy consultant with Arthur D. Little. “I was into cellulosic ethanol before it was cool,” says Sean.

Denham has staked RED with $500 million (and the company is hoping to borrow another $1.5 billion) to finance ventures like the one at West Virginia Alloys. At Alloy RED will sell the power to the public grid at 6 cents per kilowatt-hour and share the revenue with Denham Capital and West Virginia Alloys. The silicon maker will continue buying most of its 135 megawatts of power drawn from a hydroelectric plant eleven miles upriver at the unbeatable price of 3 cents per kilowatt-hour. The extra revenue from RED will cut its electricity budget by 37%.

It’s foolish not to tap the plant’s furnaces, which belch heat as promiscuously as a raging bonfire. The company warns visitors not to wear polyester, because it could easily melt during a walking tour. The furnaces are vented when needed and are water-cooled by 2-foot-wide radiator pipes that dump their heat outside in three rows of 23 loops, each 100 feet high. RED will use this heat to run steam turbines. One of those turbines, once powered by coal, is now sitting unused at the site. It is so old that some of its imported pipes carry the swastika of Hitler’s Germany.

West Virginia Alloys executive Arden Sims is champing to seize on these cost savings and has plans to open a shuttered plant in economically ravaged Niagara, N.Y. Despite higher labor costs, he’ll still produce silicon cheaper than in Asia because of less expensive energy. “We’ve known for years we’ve been blowing energy out the door,” Sims says.

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And what he sees is heat. Waste heat—one of the country’s largest potential sources of power, pouring up out of those smokestacks. If it could be recycled into electricity, that heat would generate immense amounts of power without our having to burn any new fossil fuels. By immense, I mean, speaking technically, humongous. Even after he’s winnowed the nation’s half a million smokestacks down to the most likely customers, that leaves twenty-five thousand stacks. “An astronomical number,” Smith says.

His boss at Recycled Energy Development, Sean Casten, leafs through the reams of data Smith has compiled. The biggest sources of waste heat are some gas turbines used to generate power, but there are endless other examples. “Let’s look at Florida,” he says. “Here’s a Maxwell House coffee roaster in Duval County. They’re roasting beans, so all that heat has to go somewhere. About twelve megawatts’ worth of potential electricity is going up the stack.” Casten could take the equipment he sells, a “waste-heat recovery boiler,” and stick it on top of the stack. “Basically, there’s a network of tubes with water in them. The heat would hit one side of it, produce steam, and we’d use that to turn a turbine and generate electricity. It’s like any other boiler, just without a flame, because the heat is already there.”

Does that sound suspiciously pie-in-the-sky? Casten can drive a few miles from his Chicago office to an East Chicago plant run by Mittal Steel. A few years ago, a predecessor energy-recycling company installed this kind of equipment on the smokestacks of the plant’s coke ovens. In 2004, this single steel plant generated roughly the same amount of clean energy as was produced by all of the grid-connected solar collectors throughout the world. Casten’s company estimates that recycling waste heat from factories alone could produce 14 percent of the electric power the U.S. now uses. If you took much the same approach to electric generating stations you could, says Casten, conceivably produce the same amount of energy we use now with half the fossil fuel.

Let’s cut the numbers in half to account for corporate enthusiasm. Hell, let’s cut them in half again. You’re still talking about one of the most effective ways to cut carbon emissions that we’ve got, a mature technology ready to go. You’re talking about a recycling project infinitely more important than all that paper we’ve been bundling and glass we’ve been rinsing for the last two decades. Why isn’t it happening everywhere? The first answer, says Casten, is that very few companies spend much time thinking about their waste heat. “How much time do you think about the useful things you could be doing with your urine?” asks Casten. “The guy at the coffee roaster is spending all day focused on roasting coffee beans so they taste good.”

In a perfectly rational market, however, lots of players would see that heat disappearing up the stack, realize they’re watching hundred-dollar bills spewing into the atmosphere, and set up businesses like Casten’s to try and harvest it. It’s not exactly simple—you need to understand how much heat each plant generates, how it varies day by day, how corrosive the other gases in the stack are, and so forth, but it’s no harder than a million other technical feats that a million other companies perform every day. No harder, for instance, than singeing a coffee bean to produce a robust and roasty blend. The obstacle lies in the phrase “perfectly rational market.” Electricity is essentially the opposite, a heavily regulated semi-monopoly where many of the laws work to protect the profits of utilities, and where, if you deregulate carelessly, you end up with fiascos like Enron’s calculated bludgeoning of California’s ratepayers.

For instance, in almost every state it’s illegal for anyone but the utility to run wires across a public street. So if Casten’s company generates more electricity from the smokestack of the coffee roaster than the factory can use itself, his company can’t sell the surplus to the guy making coffee cans across the street. They have to sell it to the utility, which wants to pay the lowest price possible for it. The utility argues that it still bears the cost of maintaining the network of wires that constitute the grid, and if it’s not selling to the coffee-can plant, that cost will have to be passed on to, say, residential customers.

This is a conundrum that environmentalists are going to have to help solve. They need to pressure regulators to pressure utilities to treat low-carbon energy as a precious resource, to make reducing global warming at least as crucial a goal as ensuring a reliable energy supply and keeping rates down. And indeed environmentalists have begun to have some successes along these lines. In lots of states, for instance, people with solar panels on their roofs can now connect to the grid more easily, and in some cases get
a decent price for the power they generate.

However, solar panels and windmills are somewhat sexier than waste-heat recovery boilers, and it’s possible that environmentalists have skewed their priorities accordingly. In Massachusetts, for example, Casten led an ultimately futile bid to get recycled energy included in the state’s “renewable portfolio standard,” the government mandate to generate an increasing percentage of the state’s energy from clean sources. His opponents included some in the renewable community, who feared recycled energy would edge out wind turbines and photovoltaics for dollars. “We shouldn’t set them up in a zero-sum game against each other,” says Alan Nogee, director of the Clean Energy Program for the Union of Concerned Scientists. Instead, he proposes yet another new standard, this one just for recycled energy—a sound idea, probably, but while it waits to get adopted, the carbon content of the atmosphere keeps on increasing.

Seth Kaplan, director of the Clean Energy and Climate Change Program at the Boston-based Conservation Law Foundation, calls the controversy a perfect example of “the climate advocate’s mantra: whatever the choice is, you’ve got to do both.” It’s “absolutely nuts,” he says, for there to be tension between the sun-and-wind guys and the backers of recycling schemes like Casten’s, especially since retrofitting factories to recover waste heat picks the lowest-hanging fruit while developing renewables helps build the energy system we’ll need in the decades to come.

Kaplan’s right, but if heat recycling is going to happen on the scale and at the pace required to deal with climate change, it will mean enviros being willing to focus on stuff like smokestacks and utility regulation with the same enthusiasm with which we rhapsodize about the spinning blades of windmills. That’s hard—there aren’t any good folk songs about waste-heat recovery boilers. And it’s going to mean utilities, and the politicians who regulate them, understanding that they now have three missions: keeping the lights on, at something approaching affordable prices, on a habitable planet.

Once in a while, it turns out, we get to work on all three simultaneously. Casten just signed a contract with a factory in the Southeast that makes silicon. He’ll recycle the waste heat from their stack, and as a result the solar panels made with that silicon will require a third less fossil fuel to produce. There must be a song there somewhere.

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Of the 500,000 smokestacks in the United States, the 47,500 stacks that produce waste heat above 260 degrees Celsius (500 degrees Fahrenheit) could produce at least 50,000 megawatts of power, says Casten. That’s almost half the energy produced by the U. S. nuclear fleet, he notes. Companies like RED and its competitors, Cain Industries and GTS Energy, Inc., all work to help develop waste heat recovery in the United States.

RED retrofits smokestacks with “waste-heat recovery boilers” that use the stack’s heat to produce steam to spin a turbine and generate electricity. The company uses similar technology to develop new, localized power plants that are at least two times as efficient as the average U.S. electric utility plant. According to Sean Casten, president and CEO of RED, the United States could conceivably continue producing the same amount of energy it does now, with half the fossil fuel, by recycling the waste heat from its factories and electric generating stations.

Thomas Casten says most people think of vehicle emissions as the leading driver of global warming, but in reality 69 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions come from heat and power production, and a mere 18 to 19 percent from vehicles. The heat and power sector is so inefficient, he explains, that it is like being “in the forest products business, and you just leave every fourth tree in the forest. Cut it down and just leave it there to rot.”

It typically takes three to four years for RED’s projects to make back their initial investment in the heat-recycling equipment, a roughly 35 percent return. But the practice is not widespread, Casten says, because most businesses do not take time to consider what they can do with their waste products—in this case, heat. In many states, there are also barriers to selling electricity back to the grid or directly to another business, so if a factory uses its waste heat to produce more power than it can use, it can be difficult to sell the excess, making the process less lucrative.

“We have gotten caught up in yesterday’s technology, yesterday’s rules, and yesterday’s goals,” Casten says, stressing the imperative of informing more people about the obstacles to waste heat recovery. Changes in state and national legislation that promotes recycled energy are also necessary, he says. “Climate change mitigation is a huge economic opportunity. Our trading partners are pursuing greater efficiency, and they’re finding that in the process they’re becoming more competitive and taking manufacturing jobs away from the U.S.”

This story was produced by Eye on Earth, a joint project of the Worldwatch Institute and the blue moon fund. View the complete archive of Eye on Earth stories, or contact Staff Writer Alana Herro at aherro [AT] worldwatch [DOT] org with your questions, comments, and story ideas.

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