Gladstone Biomass Terminal wins industry award

The annual ICE North West Civil Engineering Awards showcase the collective and individual achievements of civil engineers and civil engineering. This year, Gladstone Biomass Terminal won the Large Project award.

The project concerned the design and construction of a £60m wood pellet import terminal consisting of a quay side facility for the unloading of bulk loads of biomass wood pellets from Panamax ships; biomass material conveyor systems; a 100,000 tonnes storage facility; and a train and road transport out-loading area.

Ramboll has been working on the project as expert adviser to the construction contractor, Graham Construction, since 2014. Drawing on our experience from similar projects in Denmark and in the UK at Immingham, the team consisted of biomass facility experts from Ramboll’s Power division, supported by Ramboll in the UK to help meet with UK specific requirements.

“The project has been interesting in several ways. In particular we were able to apply lessons learned from the earlier Immingham projects. I am happy that the project won the award, and we are very proud to have contributed to its success”, says project manager Finn Søholm.

The Gladstone Dock biomass import terminal was commissioned in 2016. Together with the earlier Immingham project, Gladstone Dock forms part of the fuel logistic chain supplying sustainable biomass fuel to the Drax Power plant. The conversion of the Drax Power facility is by far the largest single project in the UK to help reduce emissions from electricity generation and provide reliable base load power to replace fossil fuels.