March 23rd, 2009 · No Comments

From Green Right Now Reports

As long as the world is busy refining crude oil for gasoline and other petroleum products, it may as well try to maximize the benefits from the process.

That’s the aim of “cogeneration” plants, such as the newest one put into action by  ExxonMobil in Antwerp, Belgium. The refinery there will capture heat from the refining process to generate electricity, “cogenerating” or making dual use of the refining process, according to a press release.

ExxonMobil estimates that the practice will generate 125 megawatts of power and reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 200,000 tons per year, the equivalent of removing about 90,000 cars from Europe’s roads.

The company also notes that the Antwerp facility will be “significantly more efficient than traditional methods of producing steam and power separately”. The result is lower operation costs for the company, and reduced greenhouse gas emissions for the everyone.

New cogeneration facilities are under construction in Singapore and China, which should increase ExxonMobil’s cogeneration capacity to more than 5,000 megawatts in the next three years, the press release stated.