Babcock Borsig Power

Italy

• Babcock Borsig Power's environmental subsidiary, BBP Environment, has won an order for a waste-to-energy plant to be built in Acerra, near Naples. The generating station will form part of a refuse processing facility with an overall capacity to handle 1.5 million tonne of municipal refuse each year. There is a refuse crisis in Naples where all available landfill capacity has been exhausted. The cost of the complete project is put at $284 million of which BBP's share is $59 million.

The waste-to-energy unit will recycle high calorific waste recovered at the Acerra site. Electricity will be generated from three trains, each with a hourly throughput of 27 tonne, accounting annually for around 600 000 tonne. Under Italian law the power generation will be subsidised. Efficiency is a high priority for the plant and the target is to exceed 37.3 per cent net electrical efficiency in order to offset the cost of waste disposal. Energy generation is due to start in September 2003.