Encyclis has begun hot commissioning at its Protos energy recovery facility in Cheshire, England. The waste to energy (wte) plant operator said engineers are progressively bringing systems into operation in preparation for the first waste deliveries, expected this summer. The phase will be followed by first fire on waste and the initial export of electricity to the grid.
Located in Peel NRE's Protos energy park near Ellesmere Port, Encyclis's Protos wte plant has a permitted processing capacity of 500,000 tonnes of residual waste per year and is designed to generate 49.9 MW of electricity for the national grid. In addition to power generation, the facility will recover metals for reuse.
Protos is also intended to become the UK’s first fully "low carbon" wte facility. A carbon capture plant, to be built by Kanadevia Inova, is under development adjacent to the waste facility and is to capture around 370,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide annually from flue gases once complete. The captured carbon dioxide is to be transported by pipeline for permanent geological storage in Liverpool Bay as part of the HyNet North West industrial decarbonisation cluster.
The project was initially developed as a joint venture with Macquarie’s Green Investment Group (GIG) and the British waste management company Biffa. Encyclis, then operating as Covanta, purchased GIG's 37.5 per cent stake in 2022, before acquiring full ownership of the Protos project last year.
The plant has been under construction since the end of 2020 and was then scheduled for completion within three years. Metlen Energy & Metals, formerly Mytilineos S.A., served as engineering, procurement and construction contractor. The incineration technology was supplied by Standarkessel Baumgarte.
In addition to Protos, Encyclis's fleet of energy from waste plants comprises the Dublin wte facility in Ireland, and three operational plants in the UK, Rookery South, Newhurst and Earls Gate, as well as the Corby energy recovery facility project which is still in development.
