Electricity-generating chicken farm opens in Beijing

On a day that Beijing hosts the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games, GE Energy has announced that a chicken farm that would quench the city's thirst for energy and satisfy its rising demand for protein has begun commercial operations.

 

The Beijing Deqingyuan Chicken Farm Waste Utilization plant, located in the YanQing District, about 50 kilometres north of Beijing, China, would be using GE's Jenbacher engines to produce electricity and heat from biogas sourced from chicken manure.  

 

Providing 14,600MWh of electricity per year, the project is designed to help reduce sub-urban electricity shortages.

 

By generating electricity from biogas instead of coal, the project is expected to reduce about 95,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide per year, qualifying the project for the United Nations-sanctioned Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) programme.

 

The project is reportedly reducing the farm's dust levels, further enhancing the area's air and water quality by controlling odours.

 

The improvements were also in line with Chinese government initiatives aimed at protecting the environment.

 

The farm has three million chickens, producing 220 tonnes of manure and 170 tonnes of wastewater each day.

 

The farm's new cogeneration system features an anaerobic digester system to treat the waste material, producing enough biogas to fuel two GE Jenbacher JMS 320 GS-B.L gas engines.

 

The plant has an installed electric capacity of more than 2MW for use at the chicken farm.

 

Additionally, the plant's thermal output is used to support the chicken waste fermentation process and also heat the farm in winter.

 

Jack Wen, president and CEO of GE Energy China, said the project would quickly pay for itself through the generation of cost-effective electricity and heat.

 

He estimates that the farm would save more than US$1.2 million a year in electricity costs alone.

 

GE Energy supplies power generation technology and energy delivery techniques and is involved in the construction of steam turbines, wind energy turbines and nuclear power plants. The company had revenues of US$19.1 billion in 2006, with 36,000 employees in 100 offices worldwide. The company is also a partner of the 2008 Beijing Olympics.