The first in th world (any-fuel) home power station VTES:
- provides private houses with "green" electricity and heating
- runs on any biofuel (including solid ones: wood, pellets etc.)
- is powered by the innovative steam engine
contacts:
VKontakte
The advantages of VTES over other power sources
VTES is a completely new type of autonomous power source, and today it has no direct analogues in the whole world. It is designed to provide private customers (and their households) with electricity and heating. But there are many other types of "home" power stations intended to supply private consumers - namely gas/petrol/disel power units , solar panels, wind micro-turbines, etc. Nevertheless the apparent abundance of various sources of electricity can not always cover all needs and requests which come from consumers. Below on this page the advantages of VTES over other types of small power stations will be analyzed and there will be shown what qualities of VTES allow it to better perform the role of a “home power plant”.
VTES or ICE?
If the consumer needs in autonomous electricity (independent not only from grid, but from weather too) for its household, at first glance the obvious choice is CHP unit. It is well-known type of "home power station", which provides enough electricity for house so it could be independent from external electric network. In addition CHP unit delivers heat energy for heating house as it says - CHP, or Combined Heat and Power.
Today there is only type of CHP which sells on markets and has economic basis to be bought. It is a powerblock driven by ICE, or internal combustion engine. In principle, ICE could be gas, petrol or diesel-fed motor, but nowadays almost all "home-class" CHPs are fitted with gas-type ICE. The gas for CHP is natural and comes from external gas network.
To be honest, there are two types of "home" CHPS selling in some countries else. The first type has a fuel cell as a source of electricity and features high effectiveness, but is priced at quite high level. So the sales of that CHPs are carried out mostly as experiments and supported by state subsidies. The second type is driven by Stirling motor, but due to some undisclosed reasons the productions of such CHPs were discontinued by almost all manufacturers.
On the other hand, VTES qualifies as CHP unit too, because it generates electricity and heat in parallel, in one working process. So it makes VTES the CHP of new type and the real alternative to ICE-type of CHP, and let's compare them to see what is better for private customers.
The main difference of VTES from ICE is the usage of an external combustion engine (steam) powered by a steam boiler. And the main advantage of a steam boiler as a source of power is its ability to use any combustible fuel - in liquid, gas or solid form. This means that VTES can run on any fuel what customer would choose. In modern times, conscientious customer do not want to hurt the natural environment by generating electricity along with producing greenhouse gases and other exhaust fumes. And VTES gives opportunity to have "green" power: if it runs on biofuel, such as firewood, pellets, etc., no additional CO2 adds to atmosphere. If briefly, when a wood grows, it absorbs the same amount of CO2 which will be released when that wood would burn.
From here the FIRST main advantage over ICE comes - when running on biofuel, VTES generates CARBON-FREE, real "GREEN" power!
In comparison, usual ICE-type CHP runs on gas and emits the same fumes as it comes from cars, trucks, motocycles, and other petrol-powered motors.
The next question is a cost of fuel. As a rule, the prices for all fossil-based fuels are quite high in almost all countries. These items are all hydrocarbon fuels: petrol (gasoline), gas (natural), diesel, fuel oil etc. On the other hand, there are a lot of unexpensive solid fuels, often being produced locally, not far from customer. Luckily for responsible customer, many kinds of them are "green" biofuels - pellets, firewoods, various agricultural and wood processing wastes etc. And VTES is the only home-class power station which is capable to run on any of such fuels.
That reveals the SECOND main advantage over ICE - the biofuel for VTES could be several times CHEAPER than gas or other fuel for ICE!
In addition to the difference in the cost of fuel, VTES helps to save additional savings during the heating season (in winter and just in cold months). Unlike ICE generators, which dissipate the generated heat in the atmosphere during operation, the cooling system of VTES collects all this heat for use for consumer needs. That is, VTES operates with a thermal efficiency close to 100%. This means that the energy released during fuel combustion is partly used to generate electricity, and the rest is sent to the consumer in the form of hot water - for heating and hot water supply. This is the so-called cogeneration mode, and its economic meaning can be simplified as follows: we pay for heating, but electricity is free! Or so - we pay only for fuel for electricity, and heating is a gift!
In addition to main benefits, VTES has some other advantages over ICE-type CHPs. First one is lower noise level, because steam engine has no exhaust. Second one is much longer working lifetime of VTES due to fact that steam engine runs without shock loads as ICE does. The third one is the difference between exhaust gases. The steam boiler of VTES burns the fuel the same way as usual heating boiler does. So the smoke being produced by of VTES could be channelled to the same home chimney which is used by heating boiler. And VTES could be placed instead of heating boiler to the same place in the house. But ICE emits much more harmful fumes, and must be lead out of CHP far away from house. Otherwise it could be like idling car just near the house. And such removing of ICE fumes may need in special and expensive measures.
VTES in comparison with wind (WPS) and solar (SPS) power stations
Quite often, the householder chooses "fuel-free" power units as sources of autonomous electricity, which also are known as "RES" - Renwable Energy Sources. The most popular types of home-class RES are solar and wind power stations (micro-hydroelectric power stations and some other variants will not be considered due to their small spread). The reasons to buy RES could be different - sometimes because of their ecological merits, sometimes to save on large bills for net electricity or on expensive fuel needed for ICE-type CHP. Besides, attractive features are ease of use and minimum maintenance, as well as state financial incentives for RES.
But VTES running on any biofuel also is a real "green power" source and qualified as RES, just as any WPS or SPS. Truly, when any biofuel (firewood, pellets, biogas, etc.) is burned in VTES, the same amount of CO2 is emitted to the atmosphere as absorbed by plants used for biofuel production.
What are the advantages of VTES over other RES, such as solar (SPS) and wind (WPS) power stations?
First of all, VTES is completely independent of external conditions - weather, time of day, season of the year, etc. VTES can provide the required power to the consumer continuously and uninterruptedly, all day and all night, and year round. In contrast, cloudy and calm weather can force SPS and WPS to stop work for hours, days and even whole weeks.
Secondly, owner of VTES can store any amount of energy he need - in the form of stock of fuel, like the pile of pellet bags. It is easy and cheap, and just would need in small dry area. But other RES need to rely on large number of expensive batteries. And modern technologies still can not offer economically viable kind of accumulator which is capable to spare enough power for the whole possible period of absence of sun or wind.
Thirdly, VTES can fully provide the consumer with heating house anytime, along with electricity and without additional costs. As for other "home" RES, the problem of heating has not been solved yet, especially during the winter.
And fourthly, the installation of RES is often related with difficulties. SPS could need large free area of land or reconstruction of roof, layout of WPS is restricted by possible noise and vibrations which probably would not be acceptable for neighbours. As for VTES, it can be simply installed in the house instead of conventional heating boiler.
VTES vs electric network
For standard household using external power network is more convenient and easier than exploitation of VTES. But sometimes the sum of arguments in favour of VTES could outweigh and tip the scales in favour of VTES. And the main possible reason to choose VTES is the price of electricity. In many countries some kinds of solid fuels are quite cheap, but electricity, on the contrary, is too expensive for private customers. In that case the electrical energy generated by VTES could cost considerably less than electricity "from socket" provided by network. And it describes the "summer" time, when VTES works just as power station without heating house. If VTES operates in "winter" mode and provides both electricity and heating, the consumer could reasonably assume that he pays for the heating house only. Generating electricity along with heating house does not almost increase the fuel consumption, as if house was only heated by steam boiler. So the cost of "winter" electricity from VTES is just a small fraction of usual value from electric bill - due to cogeneration principle, and the fact that VTES is real CHP station.
Another argument in the favour of VTES is unobvious and points out to primary sources of energy. When customer is recieving the electricity from socket of network, that process seems does not emit any harmful gas. But where does electric network take electricity to pass it to customer? The truth is that in many countries, even un Europe, the main part of all electricity generated by national power industry comes from fossil fuels, such as gas, oil, diesel etc.! Briefly it goes like that: the large power plants burn coal, emit greenhouse gases and harmful fumes, generate electricity, and provide private customers through power network, or grid. There are other kinds of power stations generating electricity for national grid: hydro- and atomic stations, solar plants and wind turbines, but in the most countries their total power output is still less than generation of conventional power plants burning "fossil" fuels. So customer never knows how much does he harm the natural environment when he plugs in some electric appliance to home socket.
But the situation changes if householder uses VTES for generating power. He controls the fuel being burn in VTES by his own so he will always know about impact on nature from electricity he consumed.