Foster Wheeler, the construction engineering firm, is to supply a rubbish-powered boiler island to generate steam and electricity for E.ON’s combined heat and power (CHP) plant in Sweden.
The waste-to-energy plant uses Foster Wheeler's CFB (circulating fluidized-bed) technology which can divert waste headed for landfills and convert it into steam and electricity.

Foster Wheeler will supply the 84 thermal megawatt CFB boiler and auxiliary equipment and will carry out the erection and commissioning of the boiler island.

The boiler will be designed to burn Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF) composed of sorted household and industrial wastes.

The CHP plant will produce electricity for the local grid and will provide heat and process steam to an adjacent industrial plant. The boiler is scheduled to be operational in the autumn of 2010.

Foster Wheeler say CFBs have significantly lower levels of SOx and NOx emissions, making it more economical and efficient use of waste compared with traditional incineration or older burn technologies.

Desulfurization is carried out and mainly limestone is used as the fluidizing material. For denitration, CFB boilers operate at lower temperatures, ranging from 850oC to 900oC, to suppress the thermal NOx emissions as the generation of NOx is dependent upon the combustion temperature.

The unburned carbon is collected by a high-temperature cyclone at the boiler exit to recycle to the boiler, and so increase the denitration efficiency. Foster Wheeler has carried out more than 300 installations worldwide involving its CFB technology.

'Whether it's through the use of carbon-neutral fuels or the conversion of municipal waste into energy - or the use of any one of a host of other feedstocks -- the CFB offers perhaps the broadest range of fuel flexibility on the market today' said Tomas Harju-Jeanty, chief executive officer, Foster Wheeler Energia Oy.

E.ON Sverige said it is embarking on a EUR 1 billion investment plan in CHP. Karin Jarl-Mansson, chief executive officer of E.ON Varme Sweden AB said 'District heating is an important cornerstone in the production of more efficient energy and the reduction of environmental effects.'