Thermal Energy International has announced it will buy Bristol-based firm Gardner Energy Management (GEM) .
The renewable energy firm will pay GEM's £2.7m price tag, plus up to £1.3m payable in cash and shares during a three-year period based on its acquisition's future performance.

On April 7, Thermal Energy said it expects the acquisition to be completed by July 4, 2008, subject to financing and regulatory approvals.

GEM's managing director Tim Gardner will remain with the company for at least a year to assist with the company's transition into Thermal Energy.

Headquartered in Ottawa, Canada, Thermal Energy's core market for its existing technologies (including its FLU-ACE waste heat recovery technology and its DRY-REX low temperature biomass drying technology) is the commercial and industrial boiler market.

GEM was founded by Tim Gardner in 1995 to manufacture the GEM Venturi Orifice steam trap. Since then, more than 50,000 GEM steam traps have been installed across Europe as a permanent replacement for traditional steam traps.

Traditional steam traps have a high failure rate and are a maintenance headache for firms. GEM's steam trap has no moving components to wear out and so can stop steam wastage and as a result reduce a client's energy and maintenance costs.

'The GEM technology has opened doors for us in North America and China, and been a tremendous value-add to projects involving our other technologies,' said Thermal Energy president and CEO Tim Angus.

Both Thermal Energy and GEM have similar target markets and
Thermal Energy's acquisition of GEM, will equip it with a geographic base and sales force in the UK, the Middle East, Southeast Asia, Australia and Mexico.