SUGAR COMPANY GETS DOST SUPPORT FOR RENEWABLE ENERGY FACILITY
A SUGAR COMPANY finally built a facility—the first of its kind in the country—that converts wastes to new source of renewable energy. Called the Fluidized Bed Gasification (FBG) System, the facility was recently unveiled by the Raw Brown Sugar Milling Company, Inc. in Pamplona, Negros Oriental.
The FBG System, introduced by the Department of Science and TechnologyIndustrial Technology Development Institute (DOST-ITDI), is used by manufacturing plants to convert biomass into new source of renewable energy.
Agri wastes are “burned” when a limited amount of oxygen or air is introduced into the FBG System to produce carbon dioxide and energy. This drives a second reaction that further converts waste material to hydrogen and additional carbon dioxide; this is the gasification stage.
As such, the system helps supply the company’s electric power requirements and brings down its electricity costs, says Atty. Alejandro Florian O. Alcantara, president and CEO of the company. “I see several advantages to powering our turbines with synthetic gas produced by ITDI’s FBG System. These are [a] 100 percent reduction of our agricultural wastes, production of our monthly electricity requirement at no cost, and significant reduction of gaseous pollutants due to the near-zero combustion process of the FBG System.”