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New rules for boilers and engines – ‘Medium Combustion Plant Directive’
Published:  19 November, 2015

The “Medium Combustion Plant Directive” is approaching its final stages of EU approval and will be published around the turn of the year. The UK government will then have just 2 years to draft and make new legislation that will require every medium combustion plant (with a very few specific exceptions) to be registered according to a published timescale, new plants first and existing plants a few years later.

The main objective of the Directive is to measure and control the emissions of NOx, SOx and dust from every combustion plant with a thermal input of greater than 1MW; CO will also be measured and the MCPD applies to all units up to 50MW where the Large Combustion Plant Directive takes over. 1MW thermal input is roughly equivalent to a 1.25 tonne steam boiler or a 450kVA genset.

This directive will affect large numbers of SMEs and public sector organisations who have never before been subjected to close regulation of their energy plant. Boilers, steam generators, CHP engines and turbines used in thousands of businesses and burning every type of fuel will be included in the new rules; biomass boilers and heavy oil installations will be particularly affected.

If you are considering changing your energy plant in the next couple of years there will be a ‘cut-off’ date when the plant is treated as a ‘new’ plant with stricter emissions limits and tighter control measures, so you need to make the right decisions very soon.

The Combustion Engineering Association hosted a conference on 17th November in Daventry to discuss the implementation of the directive with Defra, the Environment Agency, boiler and engine specialists and emissions experts. Defra needed assistance from industry to help them shape this important legislation.

Please visit: www.cea.org.uk for further information