[Gasification] Gasification Digest, Vol 20, Issue 10 - More on gasification economics

[David Coote]

On 19/04/2012 5:00 AM, gasification-request at lists.bioenergylists.org wrote:
> When replying, please edit your Subject line so it is more specific
> than "Re: Contents of Gasification digest..."
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>
> Today's Topics:
>
>     1. Re: Knoef et al's proposed criteria (Peter&  Kerry)
>
>    

Hi Pete,

A few comments below:

> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Message: 1
> Date: Wed, 18 Apr 2012 10:00:14 +1000
> From: Peter&  Kerry<realpowersystems at gmail.com>
> To: gasification at lists.bioenergylists.org
> Subject: Re: [Gasification] Knoef et al's proposed criteria
> Message-ID:<4F8E040E.2070408 at gmail.com>
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> On 18/04/2012 5:00 AM, David Coote wrote:
>    
>> Whoever first gets a small-scale gasifier up that meets Knoef et al's
>> proposed criteria on whether or not a gasification technology is
>> commercial could do very well.
>>      
> David,
>
>
> You are quite right about the numerous "enormous amount of small-scale
> biomass assets dotted around the countryside" and the 1500tonnes/yr is
> typical, on a 2500hr/yr duty cycle approximating their normal working
> days this equates to around 600kg/hr or for arguments sake a nominal
> 500kWe system. You will find that in practice that this cannot be
> connected to the grid in the majority of locations where this resource
> is available, (even at the a nominal 150-200kWe rating if running 24/7)
> so unless there is a on-site power requirement at this level it is still
> no go. This is the reality we rudely discovered when we first built a
> reliable system capable of this scale. In fact even where the grid
> infrastructure can support it we have found utilities over here
> extremely reluctant.
>    

It does seem to be very much a matter of having all your technical 
details available in the form they want so that you can demonstrate that 
you will disconnect from the grid when it's down, your power quality 
will be good etc It's simple now to get PV's - up to 100kWe anyway - 
connected to the grid in Oz as the regulators/utilities are comfortable 
with the technical issues. 20 years ago this was definitely not the 
case. When I suggested to the Vic regulator in the mid-90's that we 
should follow the US lead with PURPA the response was decidedly not 
favorable. Now we have getting on for 1 million rooftop PV installations 
in Oz. If you have new kit you can expect to have to jump through some 
hoops.

As for supplying in to the grid as against supplying a co-located demand 
on a levelised energy cost basis you will struggle in Australia to 
compete against large coal fired stations producing electricity at a few 
cents/kWh receiving perhaps 5-6c/kWh to supply into the grid. If you can 
supply a co-located load that's paying the utility for power at, say, 
10c-25c/kWh your economics start to look a lot better. If you start 
bidding to supply into the grid to meet peak loads the price can be a 
lot better but you will be on the hook to supply that power. Or to hedge 
your supply which will cost you.

> The point is benchmarks such as Knoef's in the end have limited value
> because they assume in the first instance that the barrier to deployment
> is technical centred only on the gasifier, when in fact it is only when
> this is overcome that a lot of different and new barriers become
> apparent.
My reading of the Workshop report is that Knoef et al were suggesting 
those as minimum criteria for consideration as a commercial technology. 
Obviously there are other considerations beyond these minimum criteria 
that may influence the uptake of a technology.

Regards

David