Our biofuel CHP units are based on standard diesel engine generating sets. The engines we use are manufactured by Perkins, a UK company headquartered in Peterborough. Perkins produces high quality, industrial engines and has an extensive worldwide dealer network, so spare parts are readily available at reasonable cost.
Cantium adapts the Perkins engine to operate reliably on pure plant oils and other biofuels. We use a ‘two-tank’ system of conversion, which means that the engine retains a small reserve of fossil diesel fuel used for starting the plant only. Once the CHP has reached a suitable temperature fuel supply is automatically switched to a second, larger tank, containing the vegetable oil.
Vegetable oil fuel is more viscous than fossil diesel, so it is heated (which reduces viscosity) before being injected into the engine. The major benefit of biofuel is that it can be sustainable; derived from plants that can be continually replanted, and is considerably less refined than fossil oils. However, this means that there may be significant variations between different types of biofuel, even in oils from similar crops in different regions. To cope with a wide range of potential fuels a purpose design external filter system is used on a Cantium CHP plant.
The control and management of the CHP plant is fully automated using a programmable electronic system linked to the internet. The system may be interrogated in real-time from any location and will report via email automatically if any pre-set alarms occur.
