Cortus Energy and Forest Energy have announced that they will pursue an alternative pre-projected location for the Parties first 2 MW biomass power plant project in Japan on account of grid connection permit issues. As a result, the investment decision for the first facility has had to be postponed though the Parties expect this to be completed later this year with an alternative location.
Cortus Energy AB, a Swedish biomass gasification technology developer and Kuni Umi Biomass Inc., (Forest Energy), a Japanese bioenergy project developer and operator have announced that they have decided to proceed with an alternative site location for the Parties first 2 MW biomass power plant project using Cortus Energy’s proprietary “WoodRoll” gasification technology. An order for the first plant is expected to occur during the second half of the year.
In May last year, Cortus Energy entered into a strategic cooperation agreement with Forest Energy to develop the Japanese market for small-scale electricity production based on biomass. In accordance with this agreement, Forest Energy commissioned a Basic Engineering for a first facility which would be followed by a plant order for Cortus Energy by mid-year 2017.
According to a statement, Basic Engineering was delivered in early 2017 and was based on a selected location in southwestern Japan. However, a prerequisite for the selected site was that the 1.68 MW grid connection permit could be increased to 2 MW in order to avail of the full feed-in tariff (FIT) benefit.
This has not been possible so the companies jointly decided to proceed with alternative pre-projected locations for the first WoodRoll project. As a result, the investment decision for the first facility has had to be postponed though the Parties expect this to be completed later this year with an alternative location.
We are pleased with the cooperation with Forest Energy and are now taking new steps to continue evaluating the alternative sites that have been pre-projected. We still see equal potential in the cooperation and the Japanese market for WoodRoll, said Rolf Ljunggren, CEO Cortus Energy in a statement.
The first 2 MWe power plant based on Cortus Energy’s 6 MW thermal gas power WoodRoll facility will provide the basis for future cooperation on similar 2 MW power plants which could be up to 25 projects over the next five years.
