The Nordic Investment Bank (NIB) has provided bioenergy company Vaskiluodon Voima Oy with a 7-year-maturity loan totalling EUR 18 million for the construction of a gasification-based bioenergy plant in Vaasa, Finland. Vaskiluodon Voima is building the new plant in order to decrease the use of coal in energy production.
The new 140MW gasificaton-based bioenergy plant will be connected to the existing power plant and it is expected that the use of coal will be reduced by approximately 25%-40%. The new plant can use biomass such as forest residues, reed and peat-as fuel. The estimated fuel demand will be acquired from the surrounding area, no more than 100 km from the power plant. The energy production capacity will stay at the current level.
Biomass gasification is a new technology developed in Finland which has not been used before on the scale now being planned. The current equipment is smaller and designed for dryer fuels. The project received the maximum amount of grant from the Ministry of Employment and Economy due to the innovative new technology being used for the first time in a large-scale project.
