INNIO Delivers Jenbacher Gas Engine for Innovative Wood Power Plant in Austria

JENBACH, Austria – September 5, 2019 – INNIO announced today that one of its Jenbacher J412 gas engines will be at the core of a wood power plant for the energy pioneers EnergieWerk Ilg GmbH, based in Dornbirn in the Austrian province of Vorarlberg. EnergieWerk Ilg will now expand the plant, built by the Tyrolian company SynCraft three years ago, by adding an additional wood gasifier and the Jenbacher J412 gas engine that will generate an output of 500 kilowatts (kW).

While wood power plants are a well-known and highly efficient technology for the conversion of wood into gas and subsequently into heat and power, they are technological challenging. Despite repeated efforts, many concepts have failed to be operational for serial production to date. This is not the case with the Stöcken wood power plant in Dornbirn, Austria, which has been in commission since 2016 and will now being expanded.

Delivered in April 2019, the Jenbacher gas engine has been tailored to meet the needs of wood gas and is expected to start operation by the end of the year. In addition to the power generated, the facility uses the engine’s waste heat as well as the heat emerging from the gasification process. This is how the facility achieves a total efficiency of more than 90%. Furthermore, every operating hour yields around 20 kilograms of valuable charcoal, which can be used for barbecues, animal feed supplementation or soil fertilization.

INNIO’s Jenbacher gas engine business unit has explored the use of special gases like wood gas for decades. With the contract awarded for EnergieWerk Ilg generating power from wood gas has come full circle for INNIO Jenbacher, having collaborated successfully with the Schwaz-based technology company SynCraft since 2008.

“Having collaborated with INNIO Jenbacher for many years, we are happy to be able to demonstrate our forward-looking technology internationally,” says Marcel Huber, founder and managing director of SynCraft. “As wind and sun are not always available as renewable energy sources, energy generation from renewable resources like wood is an excellent addition.”

The harmonized and optimized systems of SynCraft and INNIO Jenbacher will soon be used in other international projects in Japan and Germany.

“The fuel-flexible Jenbacher gas engines can deliver reliable performance with efficiencies of more than 90% with special gases,” says Carlos Lange, President and CEO of INNIO. “INNIO supports customers with tailor-made solutions and takes into account all major parameters—ranging from special gas requirements, specific emission standards and the electrical and thermal efficiency rates required to the individual economic criteria.”

Based on special gases, INNIO’s Jenbacher combined heat and power technology offers economic and ecological benefits. So far, total capacity for Jenbacher special gas engines delivered globally totals more than 11 gigawatts.

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About EnergieWerk Ilg

EnergieWerk Ilg is an innovative energy provider based in Dornbirn, generating power and heat regionally, sustainably and cost-efficiently from the renewable energy sources biomass, wood gas, sun and wind. Today the company operates six biomass heating plants, two wood power plants, four photovoltaic plants and a wind turbine. By using biomass, the company aims to stabilize the costs of the population’s energy supply, secure domestic value added and actively contribute to climate protection.

About SynCraft

SynCraft is a system supplier for innovative, highly efficient and flexible wood power plants with a capacity ranging from 200 to 2,000 kW. In addition to power and heat, these plants deliver valuable charcoal. In 2007, the company was founded as a spin-off of the MCI Management Center Innsbruck, currently employing 25 people at its Schwaz location. Today SynCraft wood power plants are built throughout Europe and also in Asia. Aschau in the Zillertal valley is the home of the subsidiary Syncraft Automation GmbH. It specializes in the control of its own power plant technology and offers automation technology solutions for the wood industry and the areas of high-frequency engineering and sewage management.