Pacific Ethanol’s Stockton plant to install cogeneration technology

STOCKTON

January 12, 2015 6:24am      

•  To use waste gas from ethanol production as energy source

•  “Will replace most of the electricity we currently purchase from the grid”

A 3.5-megawatt cogeneration system is to be added to the Stockton ethanol manufacturing plant owned by Pacific Ethanol Inc. (NASDAQ: PEIX) of Sacramento.

The $12 million cogeneration system will displace purchased electricity by using Ener-Core Inc.'s (OTCBB: ENCR) gradual oxidizer technology to convert waste gas from ethanol production and natural gas into electricity and steam. With this technology, the plant will have among the lowest air emissions in the ethanol industry, Pacific Ethanol says.

"The Stockton cogeneration system will replace most of the electricity we currently purchase from the grid and will reduce our energy costs by an estimated three to four million dollars per year,” says Neil Koehler, Pacific Ethanol’s president and CEO. “Rather than destroying waste gases, we will reuse them as a source of process energy, reducing costs and improving profitability."

Dresser-Rand Group Inc. (NYSE: DRC) will install two 1.75 megawatt gas turbine generators with heat recovery steam generators and two gradual oxidizers that are manufactured by Ener-Core. The combined system will replace the current use of thermal oxidizers. Pacific Ethanol expects the cogeneration system to be operational by the second-quarter of 2016.

Dresser-Rand stockholders in late November approved the company’s acquisition by Siemens Energy Inc.

http://www.centralvalleybusinesstimes.com/stories/001/?ID=27524