What about CO2?

Biomass CHP and the implications for CO₂ enrichment in the glasshouse.

Back to: Biomass combined heat and power (CHP)

Gas-fired CHP also produces CO₂, from which contaminants such as NO_x and CO are easily removed, so it can be utilised to enrich levels in the glasshouse. The ready availability of usable CO₂ has been a significant driver for the uptake of CHP, particularly in the intensive edible crops sector.

However, biomass systems have a very different flue-gas composition. This means that the usual catalytic flue-gas cleaning system, used for natural-gas CHP installations, is unsuitable for cleaning the flue gas in a biomass CHP. The absence of an affordable flue-gas cleaning system for biomass has been a significant bottleneck for uptake by growers of some crops, until now.

There have been systems developed in Canada and Europe which use an amine scrubber to separate the CO₂ from the rest of the flue gas.