Old pumpkins turned into renewable electricity
As reported by Energy Live News, Severn Trent Green Power is gearing up to handle a 50,000 discarded pumpkins which they plan to transform into renewable energy.
The company anticipates generating around 22MWh of electricity from these leftover pumpkins which equates to adequately powering close to 2,000 homes for an entire day.
The recycling of unwanted pumpkins is essential to prevent them from being consigned to landfills, where they decompose and release methane and local councils typically have provisions for pumpkin collection, often alongside other food waste.
In Oxfordshire, there was a notable increase in the volume of food waste observed in the week following Halloween. Similarly, in the Midlands, a substantial amount of local authority waste passed through the East and West Birmingham anaerobic digestion facilities during the same period.
Andrew Simm, Commercial Director for Green Power, said: “Last year we saw a big spike in food waste tonnages into our facilities in the week immediately after Halloween and we expect much of that food waste can be directly attributed to pumpkins, which can weigh on average about four kilogrammes each.”
At the time of writing (11.35am on 30/10/2023), if we check the last reported half hourly period of electricity demand in the UK, Biomass generated 2.53 GW’s (6.81%) of the UK’s current total demand. Gas is the largest contributor at 11.38 GW’s (30.67%), with wind generation a close second at 8.87 GW’s (23.90%)
Biomass, in the context of energy production, is matter from recently living organisms which is used for bioenergy production. Examples include wood, wood residues, energy crops, agricultural residues including straw, and organic waste from industry and households.
As we are still very reliant on imported gas for our electricity generation, prices will remain volatile for the next few years.
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