At the foot of Mount Fuji in Japan lies the City of Oyama with approximately 20 000 inhabitants. Located in Shizuoka prefecture that has 65 percent forest cover, the city has set itself the future goals of expediting nature conservation and strengthening the regional economy, especially forestry. For this reason, “Mori no Kintaro” – the forest power plant of Kintaro – was opened in September 2018.
The special architect-designed building was built using local sugi wood, Japanese cedar (Cryptomeria japonica) and equipped with various renewable energy sources. The roof of the building consists exclusively of solar photovoltaic (PV) panels, which provide a total output of approximately 50 kW.
The heart of the unique 260 kWth and 165 kWe combined heat and power (CHP) plant is a V3.90 wood gasifier with an ECO 165 HG CHP supplied by Germany-headed biomass gasification technology specialist Burkhardt GmbH and installed by Japanee partners, Sanyo Trading Co. Ltd. At the beginning of September, the technologies went into commercial operation.
The highly efficient technology converts locally produced wood pellets from a neighbouring pellet plant into heat and electricity. The heat will be supplied to nearby greenhouses, which are still under construction. The green electricity is being fed into the power grid and reimbursed with the highest tariff class under the Japanese feed-in tariff (FiT) scheme.