04-12-01 Poland is to gain substantial economic and environmental benefits as a result of an innovative $ 40 mm power project involving Rolls-Royce, a global company providing power for land, sea and air.
Rolls-Royce Power Ventures (RRPV), a 40 % shareholder in Energobaltic, has signed an agreement that gives the go-ahead for a new heat and power plant -- the first of its kind in eastern and central Europe.

The plant will form a key part of a project that will convert large quantities of natural gas -- which at present go to waste -- into clean, useful energy for the coastal resort of Wladyslawowo, north of Gdansk. Two high-efficiency Rolls-Royce gas turbine generators will comprise the core of the combined heat and power plant, which will displace some 100 inefficient and polluting coal-fired boilers that currently provide heat for the town, making them uneconomic in the process.
The project also exploits novel forms of funding besides latest technologies. Rolls-Royce Power Ventures, with its expertise in power project development and financing has, with its partners, played a central role in drawing together Poland's Ecofund, with its international government sponsors providing grant funding for environmental projects, and Poland's national environmental protection body, which is making a low-cost loan. Widespread environmental benefits will stem from the project.

Natural gas -- a by-product of oil extraction in the Baltic Sea and which at present is simply flared-off at the oil rig -- will be converted into clean LPG for road vehicles and boilers, into electricity and into thermal energy. The wildlife-rich coastal area and national park near Wladyslawowo will enjoy far cleaner air.
Bill Kelly, CEO of Rolls-Royce Power Ventures, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Rolls-Royce, said: "Rolls-Royce Power Ventures has considerable experience in developing independent power projects in liberalising international power markets. "This project is extremely significant for RRPV because it emphasises our capabilities in environmentally highly sensitive areas. It is our first power project in Poland and the relationships we have developed with environmental organisations here will signal our capabilities very clearly throughout the entire central and eastern Europe region, where demand for clean electricity is growing rapidly."

Initial work on the Wladyslawowo combined heat and power project began in 1997. Energobaltic, the joint venture company created to construct and operate the plant, will recover gases from the Baltic Beta oil production rig and transport them to shore along an 82 km coiled tubing pipeline, the longest of its type in the world.
Petrobaltic, the Polish state-owned offshore oil and gas extraction company, has 45 % of the shares and Polish engineering group Hydromex, has 15 %. Each company is based in the region's capital of Gdansk. The new plant will use some 100,000 cmpd of natural gas, producing 16,000 tpy of LPG (eliminating the use of 32,000 tons of coal) and exporting more than 80,000 MWh of electricity annually.