Old Underwear Factory to Power 10,000 Homes
An abandoned Fruit of the Loom factory in Rabun Gap, Ga. is about to get a new life as a biomass facility. The $21.5 million project will eventually generate 17MW of energy using some of the equipment left behind.
The plant will produce energy from waste from the local forest industry for non-profit Green Power EMC, a Georgia-based group of utility companies that focus on renewable energy. The waste will be used in a conventional boiler leftover from the underwear factory, which will generate steam that will power a steam-turbine generator. The electricity generated will then be sold to customers of electricity co-ops.
When the plant is completed in August 2009, it is expected to create 95 jobs and power 10,000 homes. Who would have thought that an abandoned underwear factory could create so much good? This is just another great example of the power of the second “R” – reuse. There are solutions to our energy problems all around us, if we just think creatively enough.
Source: ecogeek
