Glanford Power Station

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Glanford Power Station, showing condenser on the top left

Glanford Power Station is an electricity generation plant located on the Flixborough Industrial Estate, near Scunthorpe, in North Lincolnshire. It generates around 13.5 MW (enough to provide power to 32,000 homes). It was designed to be powered by poultry litter and it was the second of its kind ever built in the world, starting operation in 1993. It is owned by Energy Power Resources (EPR) and operated by its subsidiary Fibrogen.

After the BSE crisis, millions of cattle were slaughtered, and almost half a million tons of dried meat and bone meal (MBM) were stockpiled in secure sheds. Glanford Power Station was re-commissioned in May 2000 to burn them. It charges a gate fee for the fuel it burns, which would have otherwise been disposed of using conventional landfills^[1]. MBM has around two thirds the energy value of fossil fuels such as coal and has been labelled carbon neutral.

In January 2004, Glandford Power Plant received planning permission for the site to be extended to allow other sources of biomass to be burned. The plant technology is based on a conventional moving grate boiler and steam cycle.

In accordance with the United Kingdom Government new Renewables Obligation incentive mechanism, a premium is paid for renewable electricity generation. Each renewable generator is issued with Renewables Obligation Certificates or ROC, which they may sell to other electricity supply companies. This trade allows them to meet their obligation for the proportion of supplied electricity generated from renewable sources. The power output from the Glanford plant qualifies for ROC trading.

Despite producing "green energy", Glanford Power Station is listed as the 27th largest arsenic air emitter in England and Wales in an air quality report published in February 2000.^[2] The combustion ashes produced by the station are then disposed of via landfill (21% of fuel by mass).^[3] Before the switch to MBM, they used to be sold as agricultural fertiliser.^[4]