The NC+CHP Program was established to provide Combined Heat & Power (CHP) technology and information to North Carolina industries and businesses in order to improve profitability, reduce environmental impact and increase reliability. The program also encourages the utilization of in-state renewable energy sources to relieve demand on the state’s energy delivery system and boost local economic development.

Through the NC+CHP Program and with sponsorship from the State Energy Office, the North Carolina Solar Center seeks to establish financial, interconnection and environmental policies to support CHP, to provide demonstration studies to aid industry and commercial interest in evaluating the economics of CHP and to broker technology transfer from governmental, commercial and university partners into the marketplace. Administrators of the program are currently working with universities and energy offices from around the Southeast to establish a CHP regional application center.

CHP refers to technological applications that normally produce either electrical or mechanical power, but are redesigned to recover waste heat for further process use. Conventional centralized power systems on average convert less than 33 percent of the energy contained in a fuel into electricity; the other 67 percent of the energy potential is discarded as waste heat. By capturing this waste heat and reusing it for process heating needs, CHP plants can achieve operational efficiencies approaching 90 percent. CHP generation can be used for building space conditioning, district heating and cooling and agricultural or industrial processes. Use of CHP systems can therefore provide significant cost savings for industrial and commercial users, increasing their economic viability. Through capturing most of the potential energy contained in a unit of fuel, CHP applications can also provide environmental benefits through substantial reductions in emissions, compared to conventional separate generating and process heating supply sources.

For an individual business, the benefits can be numerous. Because of higher fuel efficiency, a CHP installation is less sensitive to fuel price fluctuations than traditional generation processes. CHP generation can be used as a primary power source, backup/standby, or used for peak shaving to receive better utility rates. Many CHP plants can utilize a wide variety of fuels, including biomass, industrial and municipal waste.

The Department of Energy (DOE) is promoting the establishment of application centers to bridge the gap between recent technical/policy developments and market applications in the area of CHP. In general, these new technologies are increasingly using gas turbines to generate electricity and capture the waste heat for use in a processing industry, or capturing downstream waste steam from electric steam turbine-generators for various process heating needs. By providing significant energy savings and other economic and environmental advantages, CHP projects have the potential to improve both the profitability and viability of a wide range of industries and businesses within North Carolina and throughout the Southeast.

Additional CHP Resources

• Distributed Energy Workshop - agenda and downloadable presentations
• Ft. Bragg CHP Project - data and schematic
• The Impact of CHP and Energy Efficiency Measures Under the REPS – a study

For further information on the services provided by NC+CHP, please contact: