KWB SPM wood stirling module, little chance of marketing

A few months ago, we presented the SPM module (as Stirling Power Module) of KWB on forums, read this topic: wood stirling cogenerators.

KWB is a very serious manufacturer of Austrian wood-burning boilers. In recent years, for example, it has been offering automatic boilers with pellets or shredded wood of high quality and performance.

stirling pellets

KWB SPM module mounted on KWB automatic pellet boiler

This weekend, during an exhibition fair, I had the chance to talk with the Benelux boss of KWB. I quickly plugged it into the SPM which had interested me greatly for a few months.

Unfortunately the reality is far from the effects of advertisements in leaflets and articles in the media which are generally content with copy and paste of press releases.

To be honest, he strongly believes that the kWB wood stirling cogenerator will never come out. Reasons mentioned: high investment price and delicate maintenance, resulting in a very risky return on investment. This is particularly linked to problems of fouling of the exchanger… causing the performance of the module to drop.

Read also:  Pantone developed.

In the (improbable) probability of commercialization, the price of the module alone would be between 5 and 7000 € for 1 to 2 kW electric, which seems reasonable but at say 0.10 € per kWh, the module should run, in the best possible way. cases (5000 € for 2kWe): 25 000h for profitability by assuming free pellets, which obviously is far from the case!

KWB is therefore working on something much more promising according to him that we will talk a lot soon: a cogeneration micro wood gasifier that would completely replace the boiler!

The price and performance of this cogenerator (5kW at least) would make it much more interesting econologically speaking!

According to Jancovici, wood gasification is the electricity generation process that has the best overall energy yield due to the non-transformation and limited transport of the fuel, despite a rather poor performance of the device.

Learn more and discuss about forums: wood stirling cogenerators

Leave comments

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked with *