enfinium will relocate CCS pilot plant in effort to expand technology trial

enfinium

WASTE-TO-ENERGY company enfinium is relocating a CCS pilot plant to its Parc Adfer plant in Wales to make space for the trial of new technology at its Ferrybridge 1 site in England.

The company is moving a containerised pilot plant that uses Hitachi Zosen Inova’s (HZI) amine-scrubbing technology and began operations last year capturing up to 1 t/d of CO2. The company said it is moving the pilot to Parc Adfer so it can compare its performance at a different energy-from-waste plant.

In its place, the Ferrybridge 1 plant will pilot a new CCS process installed by Nuada. The process uses solid sorbents called metal-organic frameworks, or MOFs, combined with vacuum swing technology to separate CO2 from process emissions.

The company says using pressure instead of heat to release the emissions captured by its technology offers energy savings of 80% compared to amine capture processes.

Both pilots will run for at least six months.

Mike Maudsley, CEO of enfinium, said: “By supporting the development of carbon capture technologies, we are advancing innovation in the UK while building our own understanding as we progress with our plans to deploy CCS across our six UK facilities.”

In December, the government warned that declining volumes of waste may mean that older, less efficient waste plants will need decommissioning. It confirmed it would not support the construction of an overcapacity of energy recovery plants and that future developments will need to prove that they are heat-efficient and can be built “carbon capture ready”.