Firm to test out technology for purifying emissions

Israel Electric Corporation signed on Tuesday a cooperation agreement with Petah Tikveh-based company Lextran to establish a testing facility for the firm’s emission purifying technology. The beta site will crop up at the IEC’s largest coal-fired facility in Israel, at the 2,600-megawatt Orot Rabin Power Plant, where Lextran will be able to conduct statistical data analyses on the performance of its innovation.

Aiming to remove nearly all of the toxins present in the flue gases emitted by power plants, the new technology is able to treat sulfur oxides, nitrogen oxides and mercury in a single absorption tower, according to the company.

“We see this cooperation as an important milestone,” said Dr. Yuval Davidor, CEO of Lextran. “Although Lextran already has commercial deployments worldwide, we do not have a testing facility that operates 24/7 on real flue gases of a coal-firing power plant. Erecting such a facility at the Orot Rabin power plant will provide unrestricted access and availability to perform tests that we do not have at the sites of our customers worldwide.”

Recently, Lextran also signed multimillion shekel contracts for the implementation of its technology in China. Employing the technology, according to Lextran, saves 40 percent in capital and 50% in operational costs for power plants, and also generates byproducts that can be useful in agricultural fertilizers.

Working with the IEC, which has been operating coal-fired plants for decades, will allow Lextran to further enhance its ability to engineer and implement its technological expertise, according to Davidor. Grateful to the IEC’s engineering division for its support, Davidor praised the electric corporation for its unmitigated support, which will allow Lextran to help “secure clean air for future generations.”

Yaakov Hain, senior vice president for engineering projects at IEC, said that the electric corporation has been evaluating several different types of technologies that could help minimize flue gas emissions in a cost effective manner, and is in the advanced stages of installing such systems per the demands of the Environmental Protection Ministry.

“We see a lot of commercial and scientific potential in the solution developed by Lextran,” Hain said. “We are more than happy to join forces and provide the company an opportunity to perform tests on real gases and obtain valuable data for further research and development and commercial evaluation of the solution. Our support is a part of the broad commitment by IEC for scientific and technological advance that will provide cleaner air through reduction of the toxic emissions and promote Israeli technologies.”