Engines

Biomass gasification based plants generate electricity by running internal combustion engines on producers gas. A diesel engine, a petrol engine or a natural gas engine can be used. No changes are required in the engines except the matching of the gas feeding systems and the adaptation of the control and regulation schemes, except when a diesel engine is converted to spark ignition.

The testing and optimisation of the gasifier-engine combination has been done over the years by the IISc team and applied in the field by Netpro engineers. With the excellent quality of cleanliness of the producer gas (very low tar and particulate matters) generated by IISc-Netpro gasifiers, engines with natural aspiration or turbo charging can be operated for thousands of hours without any significant increase in their maintenance requirements or loss of efficiency.

Tests have in fact shown that the absence of sulphur in the fuels increases the period of operation between oil changes, thus reducing maintenance costs.

Long hours of trouble free service is the prerequisite for a commercially profitable operation of any power plant and DESI Power's field experience demonstrate that with a suitable maintenance regime, IISc-Netpro gasifier based power plants can run round the clock in industrial and institutional applications.

They are being operated in villages by locally trained village staff every day for the required number of hours, normally about 10 to 12 hours daily.