$36M biomass plant to be built in Nova Scotia

“It’s funded by a private infrastructure fund,” Luciano Lisi told the Chronicle Herald at the Verschuren Centre for Sustainability in Energy and the Environment at Cape Breton University.

The biomass plant will use a gasification process to create up to 50,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per year, fertilizer as an end product and methane gas for use in vehicles.

The plant is expected to be completed by late 2014.

It would employ 15 workers, who would include engineers and computer control specialists. As well, it’s estimated the plant would mean 50 new jobs in the forest industry.

Using the process of pyrolysis, wood products from local producers will be used to create synthesized gas in one unit. Methane gas will be created from agricultural leftovers and green bin waste in another unit.

“Think of two separate engines, one that’s designed to make synthesized gas and one that’s designed to make methane, and Cape Breton Regional Municipality’s waste stream goes into the methane engine,” Lisi said.
“Mix the two gases and they burn nice and clean.”

The plant will be built on a 2.4-hectare site at the commercial park owned by Nova Scotia Lands. It will be designed by Lockheed Martin but built by local labour, Lisi said.

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