Cogeneration plant on woodchips, pellets inaugurated in Županja

GEEN Holding AS has said it formally launched its second combined heat and power (CHP) plant in Croatia. The biomass unit in Županja has the capacity of 4.9 MW for electricity and it is equivalent to the Benkovac project, finished last year. The heating portion comes in at 8.5 MW and a maximum of 10 MW.

The value of the investment is CZK 1 billion (EUR 39.2 million) and the company based in Brno, Czech Republic, revealed it expects to return it in five years. The third such plant in the country will be in Gospić, according to previous plans.

After completing the trial period, output started at a rate of 40 GWh of power per year. Woodchips and pellets are used in the turnkey endeavor, which includes a drier for the fuel. The projected consumption of biomass is 55,000 tons per annum, translating to 33,000 tons of carbon dioxide less than with conventional sources, GEEN claimed in documents.

Earlier reports indicated ten to 15 people may work at the facility. Also before, a subcontractor said the capacity for electricity generation would be 5.8 MW in total of which 4.96 MW would be eligible for incentives and that the difference would be used for own consumption.

The main contractor is Đuro Đaković Termoenergetska postrojenja Doo (ĐĐ TEP) from nearby Slavonski Brod. Biomass to Energy Županja Doo, registered in Vrbovsko, is running the CHP plant.

The Benkovac unit is designed for 41 GWh of output. The investor developed a similar blueprint for Gospić, a town in the central part of the Balkan country. Works are scheduled to be finished next year. Total expenditure on the three projects is EUR 120 million.

Croatia is incentivizing CHP or cogeneration technology as part of the strategy to lift the share of renewable sources in gross final energy consumption to 36.4%. The first domestic geothermal plant was inaugurated last month. It has a binary or ORC system.