Financial Times

Haycarb firm to build Dendro power plant on tea estates
Puritas, the Haycarb subsidiary promoting renewable energy sources for commercial and industrial purposes, has been awarded a contract to design and build a 290kW 'Dendro' power plant for two tea factories owned by Talawakelle Tea Estates Limited (TTEL).

The Rs 30-million turnkey project will supply the electricity requirements of TTEL's Deniyaya and Kiruwanaganga tea factories, with wood gassifiers utilising Gliricidia Sepium fuelwood grown on the company's own estates and supplemented with green fuelwood purchased from outgrowers, the company said in a statement.

Construction of the new power plant has recently commenced and the two factories are expected to switch from the national grid to this renewable and environment-friendly energy source by August.

Dendro power is the most cost effective of the energy sources available in Sri Lanka, where hydropower is not available. If used as a replacement for thermal power, it will enable recovery of investment in less than a year, Haycarb Group Director Engineering and Puritas Director Parakrama Jayasinghe said. In the case of TTEL, the payback time will be longer since the plant is to replace grid electricity.

Puritas is also close to signing a technology transfer agreement with India's The Energy & Resources Institute (TERI) to tap into the latter's vast experience in gassifier technology, Jayasinghe said. The necessary equipment is to be imported from India, with the balance work being undertaken locally.
Elaborating on the benefits of Dendro power, he pointed out that biomass using purpose-grown Short Rotation Coppicing (SRC) species such as Gliricidia sepium provides a low-cost indigenous supply of energy with environmental and developmental benefits.

"Biomass conversion is seen as one option for reducing carbondioxide build up, in addition to the benefits to plantations which include reduced soil erosion, restoration of degraded land and amelioration of local impacts to the environment from fossil fired power generation," he explained.

"Perhaps even more important is the potential for poverty alleviation due to the substantial additional incomes that would flow in the rural economies."
He said a comparison of the average costs of oil and wood shows that wood costs less than one fourth the cost of oil, for an equivalent amount of energy.
A member of the Hayleys Group, Puritas is the country's leading builder of sewage, water and waste water treatment plants and has gained recognition in the private sector as a constructor of dendro power plants. All technology used in its plants is designed locally with the construction and fabrication subcontracted under Puritas' supervision. Puritas also undertakes maintenance contracts and rectification of malfunctioning plants.

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