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Powergen Corporate Responsibility Report 2001

Power Technology Centre

Power TechnologyPower Technology provides technical advice and measurement services to Powergen and to external customers. It also acts as a 'shop window' for presenting Powergen's expertise to customers, including those technologies which are used to minimise the environmental impacts of modern process plant.

Activities are office and laboratory-based, but there is also a small workshop, a rig for testing combustion equipment and Powergen's coal preparation facility for analysis of coal samples as part of the purchasing and evaluation procedures.

The site was originally opened in 1970 as the Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB) Midlands Region Scientific Services Department. The location was renamed as Power Technology Centre (PTC) in December 1991.

Environmental work at Power Technology
Much environmental science expertise is available at PTC. Examples of work undertaken, include:

  • Continuing assistance to locations throughout the company, to enable the development of environmental management systems
  • Audit expertise to ensure compliance with specific environmental requirements
  • Environmental training, from general awareness to technical processes
  • Specialist monitoring of stack gas composition and atmospheric emissions
  • Studies to establish the environmental impact of burning alternative fuels, from reclaimed fuel oil to palm oil (biomass)
  • Environmental assessments of new power related projects
  • Evaluation of proposed new methods of environmental control and reporting

Compliance

There were no environmental complaints or incidents during 2001.

Environmental Management System

Certification of the PTC site to ISO 14001 was achieved in July 1998.

Atmospheric emissions

The principal atmospheric emissions from the site arise from the 1MW combustion test rig. During 2001, the tests released:

  • 136.8te of CO2

  • 0.22te of NOx

  • 1.6te of SO2

PTC used a total of 5,435,070kWh of electricity during 2001, accounting for 2391.4te of CO2.

Water abstraction and liquid effluents

Liquid effluents from Power Technology can contain traces of acids, alkalis and organic solvents used in laboratory and small test rig studies. Only spent cooling water was discharged from the large test rigs and facilities.

All effluents from Power Technology are combined with general effluents from the adjacent Ratcliffe-on-Soar power station and treated in the station effluent treatment plant before being discharged into the River Trent.

Total water use for PTC in 2001 was 5,609m3.

Waste

Ash from the combustion rig's normal operations is non-hazardous and is disposed of infrequently via the general disposal ash skip. The remaining solid waste produced in 2001 consisted essentially of non-hazardous office waste. In addition, a small amount of special waste was generated such as used oil, spent reagents and clinical waste from the first aid room.

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