The Procter & Gamble Company (P&G) and Constellation, a subsidiary of Exelon Corporation, announced the completion of a 50-megawatt biomass-fueled combined heat and power plant located at one of P&G’s largest U.S. facilities.
Constellation owns and operates the plant, which supplies steam to P&G’s Albany, GA paper manufacturing facility and generates electricity for the local utility, Georgia Power. Additionally, steam from the plant will be used to power an 8.5-megawatt steam-to-electricity generator at the Marine Corps Logistics Base in Albany, helping the base increase its energy security and utilize renewable sources to meet energy demands.
P&G has made a commitment to reduce energy consumption and obtain 30% of its energy from renewable sources by 2020. The biomass-fueled plant provides P&G with 100% of the steam energy used to manufacture Bounty paper towels and Charmin toilet tissue at that location. Along with P&G’s recent wind energy project in Texas, this plant nearly doubles the Company’s use of renewable energy. Together, these renewable projects get P&G nearly two-thirds of the way to its goal.
The plant’s fuel supply will come from locally abundant biomass that would otherwise have been left to decay, burned, or potentially sent to landfill, including discarded tree tops, limbs, branches and scrap wood from local forestry operations, crop residuals, such as pecan shells and peanut hulls, and mill waste, such as sawdust.
Georgia Power’s purchase of energy from Constellation is part of its multifaceted strategy to encourage and cultivate renewable energy sources in Georgia and was made possible under a program co-developed with, and approved by, the Georgia Public Service Commission.
