Published: September 06, 2007 10:23 am            

Benson plant generates power from turkey litter

Originally published in the August 24, 2007, print edition.

It stands 150 feet tall. It gobbles up 1,500 to 2,000 tons of turkey litter and other assorted biomass feedstocks every 24 hours. It generates upwards of 64 megawatts of electrical power of which 55 MW is fed into the Xcel Energy grid. It cost $202 million.

It’s the first poultry litter-fired power plant in the United States. As the New York Times reported on June 6, “It sits at the intersection of two national obsessions: an appetite for lean meat and a demand for alternative fuels.”

The big Fibrominn power facility sits in the northwest corner of Benson, a town of 3,376, only a couple blocks away from the Chippewa Valley Ethanol plant.

“We started operations early April and are now very close to completing the shakedown phase,” said Greg Langmo, Fibrominn fuel manager, in a June 28 visit with The Land. “There’s still a few things that pop up from time to time giving us some temporary indigestion but we’re getting the problems sorted out.”

The creation of Fibrominn

A state legislative mandate in the early 1990s permitted Xcel Energy to continue using its nuclear reactor plants at Monticello and Red Wing, and store its waste containers at Prairie Island, in exchange for agreeing to provide 110 MW of biomass power annually. The turkey litter-powered facility in Benson provides half of that requirement.

“We have a 21-year, fixed-price contract with Xcel Energy,” said Langmo, a third-generation partner in Litchfield-based Langmo Farms, which raises 900,000 head of turkey, and in turn produces about 8,000 tons of poultry litter each year.

Ruper Fraser, CEO of Fibrowatt, the Philadelphia-based firm that built Fibrominn, said his company has been running three such plants in Britain for several years.

“We’re seeking to provide an environmentally sustainable service to the industry which produces renewable energy,” Fraser said. “We’re not claiming to be the only solution, but our goal is the reduction of dependence on fossil fuels and their attendant pollutants, and do this in an environmentally responsible manner.”

Minnesota, the No. 1 turkey state in the nation — producing about 44.5 million turkeys in 2005 according to U.S. Department of Agriculture statistics — seemed the logical place to start a new electricity-producing venture in the United States. Observers say the Benson plant, as a first-in-the-states test model, is being watched closely because Fibrowatt has plans to expand its U.S. operations elsewhere, particularly into the “broiler country” of the southeast United States.

Electricity generated in coal-fired plants is still cheaper than that provided by Fibrominn, but because the price of fossil fuels keeps increasing, the Xcel Energy contract is more cost-effective today. Karen Hyde, Xcel’s managing director of resource planning, said waste-burning electricity is still about 30 percent more expensive than power from conventional plants. Three tons of poultry litter gives off as much energy as a ton of coal.

“This is a small step, but a very important step, toward doing something to counterbalance the effects of greenhouse gases,” said Steve Wilson, a purchased power analyst for Xcel Energy.

Environmental impact

Fibrominn certainly is not without its doubters.

“We shouldn’t assume that because something is called an energy source, it’s a good one,” said J. Drake Hamilton, science policy director at Fresh Energy, an advocacy group in St. Paul. “You have to evaluate: where did this waste product come from? You have to look at the whole life cycle, how the plants were grown, what the turkey was fed. You want to be careful about what you’re putting into the air and water.”

According to information in one of its federal air permits, the plant is a source of particulate matter, sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and hydrogen sulfide. However, “All projected impacts were well below Minnesota’s health risk values,” the permit reads.

Langmo understands the criticism, partly because he is a farmer and he knows the fertilizer value of poultry litter when used in crop production. But he’s also a business realist who traveled several times to Britain to view these litter-burning electrical plants in operation. He also studied the energy trends, both the continually growing usage and the increasing dependence upon fossil fuel sources.

“This is the only advancement in manure utilization since the advent of the manure spreader,” Langmo said, “and that is 100-year-old technology.”

Steve Olson, executive director for the Minnesota Turkey Growers Association, said “turkey litter has long been used as a source of organic fertilizer because of its nutrient value plus its residual enrichment of soils. But Fibrominn now offers another opportunity for growers who A) may not have land base for the litter, or B) may simply choose not to have to deal with the litter.”

Olson noted that this new market is generating more “real value” for turkey litter, rather than addressing it as a waste product looking for a convenient means of disposal.

“The poultry producer still has a choice as to what they want to do with their litter,” Langmo said. “We offer a variety of contracts. ... Realistically I doubt we’ll ever process even half of Minnesota’s turkey litter. But if it’s good for the corn and soybean producers to be getting stronger prices because of renewable energy, then by the same token it is also good for the turkey producers to get a stronger price for their litter because of ‘new competition’ in the marketplace.”

Other feedstocks

Poultry litter will not be the only feedstock for Fibrominn. Already, huge quantities of wood chips, corn stover, native prairie grasses, sunflower hulls and urban wood wastes stemming from Dutch elm disease are finding their way to Fibrominn.

“We have a list of nearly 70 different feedstocks that potentially could be used here. Every load gets a quality check so we are constantly monitoring the relative values of the various feedstocks,” Langmo said. “As you might expect, those feedstocks that deliver higher heating value scores also get the higher payback. Boiler efficiency is what this is all about. Certain products, such as drier turkey litter, generate much higher boiler efficiency. By the same token, turkey litter that is four to five years old and totally composted has virtually zero value. It is already mostly just ash material.”

Feedstocks will be trucked several miles if necessary. “For the ‘right stuff’ I can justify trucks hauling in from 150 miles,” he said. “By the same token, we’ve already had to turn back some waste material because it had zero quality value. BTU values are wildly variable from one feedstock to another. So our feedstocks will be constantly changing, which is part of the economic beauty of this operation.”

Grove City trucker Dale Hoerchler is owner-operator of D&D Venture Inc. and routinely hauls truckloads of waste wood products to Fibrominn. Tree trimmings, old wood pallets, wood chips, sawdust, construction wastes, even trimmings from area furniture manufacturers are just a few of the various biomass sources for Hoerchler. All this stuff is ground up with magnets extracting any metal pieces prior to delivery to Fibrominn. Dumping time at Fibrominn is strictly a matter of traffic. “Sometimes it’s a 15-minute turnaround, sometimes it can be an hour,” Hoerchler said.

He’s had farming experience, including working at turkey barns, so he clearly understands the pros and cons of this new industry.

“I’ve hauled litter long enough to know that when it’s the middle of the winter and you’ve got two feet of snow on your ground, or in the spring and you have a foot of mud, it’s not very much fun handling litter,” Hoerchler said. “State regulations are more specific on piling turkey manure in fields, so many feet away from tile intakes, drainage ditches, how long you can leave a pile in place, etc. A commercial buyer that also does pickup directly at your farm could be a welcome change.”

Variation in valuation

Suppliers to Fibrominn have considerable flexibility — anything from just a single load to upwards of a 10-year contract, Langmo said. Suggesting an average contract price for feedstocks delivered to Fibrominn is extremely difficult at this early stage, he said, simply because of the many quality factors involved, and whether the producer is delivering or Fibrominn is sending out trucks. Supply and demand of any given feedstock at any given time will always be a factor; brooder litter, finish litter and breeder litter each have different quality values, for example.

Langmo openly admitted that whenever he quotes a price he gets in trouble, but “we have to compete in the marketplace or we won’t be around.” Some suppliers talk $4 to $8 per ton but Langmo suggested the range is likely even wider depending on the many factors.

Bottom-unloading semi rigs delivering 24 tons of litter per load are the delivery process to Fibrominn. They expect to get up to 100 truckloads per day, delivering from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. At the plant, trucks back into a large closed fuel hall kept under a lower air pressure than the surrounding atmosphere. The boiler draws its combustion air from a large duct leading from the fuel hall, so odors are burned instead of escaping to the outside.

An automated crane system sorts the litter by moisture content and feeds it to an enclosed conveyor system to the huge boiler where it is burned; 70 tons per hour. The empty trucks go to a separate building where they’re washed and disinfected.

“This is a much cleaner operation than a coal plant,” said Chuck Wagoner, the plant’s construction manager.

The emissions stack stands 299 feet, 11 1/2 inches tall. The plant has approximately 12 miles of pipe, 60 miles of electrical cable, two 20-ton cranes in the fuel halls and produces about 14 tons of ash per hour. The plant has 30 employees. Fibrominn is not in a JOBZ program area so received no special tax considerations from the state of Minnesota.

“We’re paying a full load of taxes,” Langmo said. “We didn’t get any deferred tax incentives from either the city of Benson or the state of Minnesota, nor was any grant money involved. We secured financing from six different banks. We’re a prime example of private money going to work to create an entirely new industry here in rural Minnesota.”

        

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