by Brianna Crandall — July 7, 2014—Both the environment and organizations operating closed landfills received a boost with the recent launch of Cleanergy’s GasBox. Reportedly an industry first, Cleanergy’s GasBox was specifically developed to generate electricity and heat from methane gas being emitted at the 1,900+ landfill sites in Europe that are more than 10 years old.
Currently, the methane gas at these sites—produced by the decomposition of organic matter—is burnt at source to prevent it from entering the atmosphere. Because methane warms the earth’s atmosphere 20-30 times more than carbon dioxide, burning it—with the resultant carbon dioxide emissions—is said to be the “least worst” option for the environment.
The European Union Landfill Directive of 1999 states that flaring is only an option if it is impossible to extract energy from the methane gas. But up until this launch, older landfill sites have often broken these directives because the gas combustion engines traditionally used at newer landfills where methane levels are above 40 percent simply cannot produce electricity from lower-grade, “dirty” methane, notes the company.
Cleanergy’s GasBox addresses this specific problem and is reportedly the only technology able to produce both electricity and heat from a methane gas concentration down to 18 percent. This biogas is produced from manure, food waste and plant residues at landfill sites as well as at waste water plants and on farms.
With a return on investment (ROI) of just three to five years, Cleanergy’s GasBox is already commercially deployed at several locations in Sweden (in collaboration with the Swedish Energy Agency) and at the Yggeset waste disposal park in Norway. Energy produced by the GasBox is being used to power equipment and to heat and electrify buildings.
Cleanergy’s GasBox has also been installed at closed landfill sites in Norfolk, Shropshire, Yorkshire in the UK, and also in Poland, as part of the ACUMEN project. The Assessing, Capturing and Utilising Methane from Expired and Non-Operational Landfill project is being led by the Environment Agency and funded by an EU environmental program. Cleanergy’s GasBox is the first power technology that was selected for evaluation.
Installed inside a modular container, Cleanergy’s GasBox is an autonomous and flexible stirling engine unit. Also inside the container is a real-time power management system with remote access; a fuel pipe; plus a heat and electricity connection to a house/factory/warehouse with optional grid functionality.
Headquartered in Sweden and established in 2008, Cleanergy specializes in the development, manufacturing and deployment of energy solutions for the solar and gas industries, which are currently deployed from Inner Mongolia to the U.K.
