September 5, 2003—Governor George Pataki has announced $14.5 million to support 36 distributed generation and combined heat and power (DG and CHP) projects throughout the State. The awards will support projects designed to increase clean, efficient and much-needed generation capacity, and to support the development of improved generation technologies.
The 36 New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) projects represent a total investment of $90.5 million in distributed generation and combined heat and power initiatives when co-funding for the projects is factored in. These combined heat and power systems will enable commercial, agricultural, and industrial energy users to generate their own electricity, while using waste heat from the electric generation equipment for productive purposes, such as space or water heating.
Combined heat and power applications provide much greater overall efficiency than centralized power plants deliver by taking advantage of the waste heat. The overall efficiency of a typical combined heat and power system approaches 75 percent, while the overall efficiency of centralized power plants is about 35 percent due to heat losses at centralized plants, and transmission losses in delivering power from the plant to the customer.
As evidence of the interest in combined heat and power, NYSERDA reviewed more than 117 proposals seeking $38 million in funding for $277 million worth of projects. The 36 projects were selected after a rigorous technical evaluation of each proposal to determine the likelihood of success as well as the economic and environmental benefits associated with the proposed projects. NYSERDA will award the $14.5 million pending successful negotiations with each of the 35 winners. For a complete list of projects selected for funding, contact the New York State press releases.
