Tanzania: Tobacco Firm Opts for Ecofriendly Boiler

Source from:  Tanzania Daily News 11/27/2014

Carbon emissions have been on the rise globally due to increased use of energy sources which are unfriendly to the environment in industrial production and other human activities and thus leading to global warming and destruction of the ozone layer.

It is on this backdrop that industries in both developing and developed world are switching to eco-friendly energies as they seek to join the global campaign of reducing carbon emissions.

One such industry is the Morogoro-based Tanzania Tobacco Processors Limited (TTPL) which plans to convert its heavy furnace oil (HFO)-fired boiler to biomass by June, next year, according to its Engineering Director, Mr Henry Lambert.

The biomass boiler would be delivered in Tanzania next month, whereas installation and commissioning is expected by June, 2015. At the processing plant, the boiler is used for steaming and drying of tobacco leaves.

"The conversion from HFO to biomass is in line with TTPL and its major shareholder the American based Universal Leaf Inc's Environmental policy to reduce its carbon footprint," Mr Lambert said in an interview.

Not only would the plant reduce emissions but it would create more jobs and significantly cut down costs that TTPL has been incurring to purchase HFO to run the current boiler.

"The cost of purchasing and installing the biomass boiler is US 2 million dollars while we are currently using the same amount just to buy fuel per annum.

"We could have used natural gas to operate the boiler but unfortunately there is no appropriate infrastructure in place at the moment to transport the energy to Morogoro and remain competitive," the Engineering Director explained.

"Through biomass we will be able to reduce carbon emissions by 95 per cent while coal could have reduced by 93 per cent," the engineer explains.

Adding; "The data is according to studies which have been conducted by Biomass Energy Centre which is owned and managed by the United Kingdom Forestry Commission."

According to the director, TTPL will be sourcing wood dust and thus leveraging advantages from Kilombero Valley Teak Company (KVTC) which produces the energy in excess of 42,000 cubic metres per year and with a capacity of increasing it to 58,000 cubic metres.

"TTPL requires a maximum of 7,000 cubic metres per year. The use of biomass will improve the viability of both TTPL and KVTC as TTPL is purchasing a less expensive fuel and KVTC is selling a further byproduct," he explained.

"The boiler will have the ability to burn biomass or HFO. When natural gas becomes available a small modification will enable it to burn natural gas.

To the boiler to operate the fuel has to be in a powder form. It will have an ability to burn fine biomass such as wood dust, cotton husks rice husks.

KVTC will form a joint venture with another company namely EB Cochrane to manufacture biomass wood dust from Teak residue obtained from KVTC as a waste produced by the saw mill.

In the process of manufacturing its product (Teak timber for export) KVTC has about 30 per cent waste material such as sawdust, trimmings and off cuts.

The process to produce the biomass will include milling the teak residue into a powder; compress the powder into blocks for transport purposes after which the blocks will then be pulverised into powder at TTPL's site.

A comparison of a similar biomass boiler operating at Aspen Pharmaceutical Company in South Africa shows that the biomass boiler has lower emission levels pollutants including Sulfur Dioxide, Nitrogen Dioxide, Particulate matter and Carbon Monoxide. Enditem