Cleantech company Hitachi Zosen Inova Australia has selected three ABB ACF5000 analyzers as part of a complete continuous emission monitoring solution to accurately monitor the composition of exhaust gases at its new large-scale East Rockingham Waste-to-Energy facility, located 45 km south of Perth in Western Australia. High-tech facilities like this waste to energy plant address two major challenges facing Australia because they deliver sustainable and affordable solutions for both electricity generation and waste management, according to the Australian Renewable Energy Agency which provided support for the project via grant funding. The plant will generate 29 MW of electricity for the local state-owned electricity grid, more than 50 per cent of it deemed to be renewable. This is enough capacity to power 40,000 homes from an annual feedstock of up to 330,000 tonnes of municipal, industrial and commercial waste. The byproducts from the incineration process will be used to build roads and produce construction materials, ensuring that 70,000 tonnes of bottom ash will not go to landfill.

The success of the AUD 511 million project is vital to improve waste diversion rates. Perth is built on a sandy coastal plain and heavily reliant on groundwater as its primary source of potable water, so when existing landfill sites reach capacity, new metropolitan area landfill sites are unlikely to be approved.

ABB's multi-component gas analyzers will help the plant operator control the cost of compliance, remove complexity, and maximize profit while operating in a sustainable way. Digital service technology will be a key feature of the project, particularly ABB Ability Condition Monitoring for measurement devices which will enable ABB to provide remote support during commissioning, start-up ana throughout the analyzers' lifecycle. This means ABB will contribute expert engineering input without visiting the site, enabling condition-based maintenance instead of schedule-basea maintenance, with interaction secured by ABB's world-leading cybersecurity technologies.

In addition to developing and constructing the state-of-the-art facility in the Rockingham Industrial Zone, which will be the second largest of its kind to be built in Australia, HZI will also part-own and co-operate it. Waste-to-energy projects attract the highest level of assessment by environmental regulators and having the combination of ABB's world-class gas analyzers and expert services will help ensure maximum up-time, regulatory compliance and continued profitable operations. ABB CEMS consistently achieve in excess of 98% up-time, which means less maintenance effort, lower total cost of ownership and elimination of the stress and workload caused by non-compliance.

Once operational in December 2022, this new plant and its process will achieve 96 per cent diversion from landfill. This will make a significant environmental impact given that more than 23 million tons of waste goes into Australian landfill every year, with Western Australia having the highest waste generation rate per capita, coupled with the lowest recovery rate, of any state in Australia.

The project had financial close on 23 Dec 2019 and is owned by a consortium consisting of John Laing (40%), Masdar/Tribe (40%), Acciona Construction (10%), and Hitachi Zosen Inova (HZI), (10%). The project shareholders awarded the contract to design, bund and commission the plant to an EPC consortium formed by Acciona Industrial and HZI.