TEHRAN – Iran’s Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Organization (known as SATBA) has it on the agenda to construct biomass power plants with the capacity of 400 megawatt-hours (MWh) across the country, an official with the organization announced.

Reza Samadi, director-general of SATBA’s Technical, Economic, and Environmental Assessment Office, said the organization has put on the agenda a plan to identify and solve the problems of existing biomass power plants in addition to construct new power plants with a total capacity of at least 400 MWh.

The official said northern provinces and metropolitan areas are the priority for the construction of the mentioned power plants.

He noted that there are currently seven biomass power plants with a total capacity of about 14 MW in the country, which are not operating at their full capacities due to technical, legal, or economic problems.

According to Samadi, if the goals of this program are achieved and new biomass power plants with the capacity of 400 MWh are constructed 3,000 kWh of electricity can be generated annually, and it will also lead to energy efficiency and reduction of transmission and distribution network losses while saving 850 million cubic meters of natural gas.

Explaining the process of turning waste into compost, Samadi said that in metropolitan areas, 65 percent of the waste is wet, of which 60 percent can be converted to compost which contains energy. Dry waste also accounts for 35 percent of the waste and their recycling has a high economic justification, of which about 10 percent is currently recycled.

“One of the major sustainable solutions to overcome the existing environmental crises is the production of energy through biomass resources, which is an optimal and economical way to generate energy in the world and reduces the volume of waste and its destructive effects while producing electricity and heat,” he added.

EF/MA