Moneypoint Environmental Retrofit Project

Background
In June 2004 the Board of ESB approved capital expenditure of €368m for the Moneypoint Environmental Retrofit Project (MERP).

The project started in 2004 and runs until the end of this year. It has three main works streams:

1. Installation of emissions abatement technology to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from Moneypoint and to bring it in line with EU Directives. Flue-gas desulphurisation (FGD) equipment has been installed to reduce sulphurous oxide (SOx) emissions by as much as 90% from their current level of 29,000 tonnes per year and selective catalytic reduction (SCR) equipment has been installed to reduce nitrous oxide (NOx) emissions by as much as to 85% from its current level of 21,000 tonnes per year. The FGD and SCR equipment is installed individually on each of the three generating units at Moneypoint, with the further addition of common plant to serve all three units. The main contractor for this work is AE&E Lentjes.
2. Change of the control and instrumentation (C&I) system to allow the integration of the new processes and to reduce obsolescence of existing systems. The main contractor for this work is Siemens.
3. Refurbishment of the existing generating plant.

There has been substantial work completed on the project in the last three years. During this period there have been more than three million contractor manhours worked on the MERP site alone, with a peak workforce of 750 contractors. When the existing station staff are added to this figure, as well as the 300 contractors working in the station during overhauls, the total number of personnel entering Moneypoint during peak periods of construction reached as many as 1,300 workers.

Current status
The change of C&I systems on Units 1 and 3 was completed during major outages in 2006 and 2007, with the change to the C&I systems on Unit 2 taking place during the current 19 week unit outage. These outages have also allowed the tie-in of ducting from the FGD and SCR equipment to the existing plant, as well as allowing the generating plant to be refurbished.

The project recently passed some major milestones when the FGDs on Unit 3 and Unit 1 went into SOx abatement mode on Saturday, February 16th and Thursday, March 20th respectively. It is expected that the SCR equipment on these units will go into service in the coming weeks.

FGD and SCR equipment for Unit 2 is currently under construction and will enter service towards the end of this year.

Did you know?
Some interesting numbers from MERP:

• 70,000m2 of scaffolding erected to date.
• 19,000 tonnes of steel required.
• 250km of control and signal cabling used.
• 9km of fibre optic cable installed.
  
  EM