The plant in Ahlen has also been tailor-made, with each of the six CHP plants equipped with a 16V 4000 gas engine that delivers up to 1,600 kW of thermal output and 1,500 kVA of electrical power.
In total, more than 9 MW of electrical power and just under 10 MW of thermal output are available for the operation of the company’s facilities.
In addition, a solar plant is to be added in future as a renewable source of energy. Four of the six CHP plants will cover the heat and power demand, which in some cases fluctuates quite considerably. “They operate normally at 75 per cent capacity, so there is a sufficient buffer above and below this level,“ says Markus Sheets from the Augsburg location, who looks after the plant as the project manager on behalf of Rolls-Royce, adding: “When breakfast time is over, the energy demand peaks quickly. This is when we generally need all four modules running. At other times of the day, one is quite sufficient.“
Two additional CHP plants provide a safety reserve, which is particularly important in off-grid plants. In the event of a CHP plant outage, a standby plant starts up and reaches full load within 70 to 80 seconds. The load surge, which initially caused the energy shortage is absorbed safely in the first 200 milliseconds by heavy, rotating flywheels that are integrated in the microgrid. Two battery containers seamlessly cover the remaining energy shortage, but can also take over the supply of power during off-peak operation or over the weekend.