London Energy and Delta Mobrey worked in tandem to ensure continued energy production could be sustained when a boiler level control board was found to have damaged electrical components at the London Energy site. The original vendor no longer supported the product, but London Energy needed to find a resolution as soon as possible. In under a week, Delta Mobrey worked with the engineers from London Energy, conducted testing and fault-finding analysis, and found a unique solution that enabled London Energy to continue using its existing infrastructure with Delta Mobrey’s SIL2 capable Hydrastep 2468.
London Energy – The Customer with a Focus on Reuse, Recycling, and Recovery
London Energy collects the waste from six London areas, the equivalent of about 1.9 million homes and reuses some consumables found, recycles them, or incinerates the generic waste and recovers the energy by generating electricity. This electricity is then returned to the National Grid for use by the London Energy site, local businesses, and the local community.
The process of collecting waste and turning this back into energy for the local area is known as a circular economy, and this is something that London Energy excels at. Their energy plant is one of the largest in the UK, so an extensive number of homes and residents depend on the successful management of the entire process.
Waste to Energy Production by London Energy
To produce 270,000MWh of electricity, London Energy burns the contents of five bunkers, with a capacity of six thousand tonnes of waste in each. The heat generated from the incineration process feeds an industrial steam boiler and creates super-heated steam, which drives a turbine to generate the required electricity for the National Grid and the local business park.
The incineration process is highly regulated, so any emissions are within defined tolerances. At London Energy, they have five industrial steam boilers, one for each of the bunkers. The steam boilers are exceptionally powerful and need consistent supervisory management and maintenance to ensure not just the production of electricity, but also the elimination of waste.
A Problem With Production
One of the control boards had a failed boiler level control circuit board, with damaged electronic components. Losing the electronic boiler level control on the number 5 boiler meant London Energy could not operate the boiler safely. The original equipment supplier no longer sold or supported the damaged part.
To maintain the required level of energy output, London Energy needs to have all five bunkers and steam boilers functioning well. If one aspect fails, they will have a backlog of waste which would be detrimental to health, as well as a 20% drop in the level of electricity sent to the National Grid. This is a significant problem for an organisation such as London Energy, who provide essential electricity to the surrounding community.
Delta Mobrey Service Department
London Energy called our service team, requesting a site visit to assess the damage to see if the circuit board could be repaired.
In under a day, we had a field engineer onsite measuring the system at London Energy and preparing to return to our factory with the damaged PCB and an electrode. At the Delta Mobrey premises in Camberley, we conducted tests on the customer’s equipment, and within a few hours concluded the board was not salvageable, and a replacement board would need to be designed.
We continued to conduct tests on the electrode provided by London Energy and discovered it worked on our Hydrastep 2468. Within a few days, our tests had proven we could use a new Hydrastep 2468 to take the information from the old water column. This ensured that we could fit a main board from our SIL2 capable Hydrastep and use it within London Energy. At the customer’s premises, we also mounted an external remote display and one internal remote display for the control room.
In under a week, we assessed the problem, completed specific engineering tests on the equipment, checked the compatibility between the current system with our product portfolio and installed it at the customer’s premises; ensuring they were working back up to their full complement of waste to energy bunkers and boilers with reduced impact on the supported community.
Delta Mobrey works with customers to overcome a variety of engineering issues and uses our in-house expertise to provide a viable solution. As a company, we specialise in product adaptations to make a product solution for a customer’s specific needs.
