Cogeneration Plant
When the Cogen plant went into operation in 1988, the generators began running 24/7
because the University could produce electricity at a cheaper rate than it would pay the
Electric Utility for purchased electricity. In 1994, the Utility became concerned that
BJU was not buying much power from them and approached BJU to talk about a more mutually
beneficial arrangement for supplying campus power. The end result of those discussions
was a new negotiated rate schedule for BJU. Under an agreement that was unique for the
Utility at that time, BJU would buy electricity based on pricing that changed every hour
according to the cost incurred by the Utility to produce the electricity. The Utility
costs depend on which power plants they need to operate during a given hour of the day.
Some are more expensive to run than others, and the cost is passed on to BJU.
Since May 1, 1995, BJU has received the next day's hourly pricing schedule from the Utility at about 3:00 each afternoon. About 90-93% of the time, it is significantly less expensive for the University to buy electricity from the Utility than it is to generate it ourselves. However, when the hourly price rises above the threshold where it becomes cheaper to generate our own power, the Cogen operators start up the generators to reduce the amount we buy from the Utility. At times the price has gone up as much as 18 times the regular price. During those times it is very important to conserve as much as is reasonably possible because Cogen does not have enough generating capacity to allow the University to totally avoid purchasing the expensive power.
The new arrangement has been a win-win situation for both BJU and the Utility. BJU gets inexpensive power most of the year, saving the University hundreds of thousands of dollars each year in operating costs which in turn helps keep student tuition down. In return, the Cogen generators provide a load reduction for the Utility during times when it is expensive for them to operate, thus reducing their operating costs.
The taller stacks at the Cogen plant allow the University to operate under a new, less restrictive set of operating limits set by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control (SCDHEC). Those agencies set operating limits for our boilers and diesel generators based on the amount of emissions produced by companies and institutions across the state and the concentrations at each of those locations. BJU Safety Services does complex computer modeling to analyze over 10,000 individual locations across the campus to determine the acceptability of the pollution levels.
Raising the stacks has lowered the amount of emissions that reach the ground, thus allowing the University to apply for and receive approval to operate more hours per year and to burn fuel oil rather than natural gas in one of the boilers and three of the diesel generators. Fuel oil is less expensive than natural gas at times, depending on market conditions, and was previously limited or prohibited from use in most of our equipment. The higher stacks will reduce the annual operating cost of the plant, thus helping to keep student tuition from rising.