The power plant in Zolling has big plans, as it wants to play a central role in the energy transition in the district.
Zolling / Anglberg -
Onyx Power and bayernets are working together at the Zolling power plant. Yesterday, Tuesday, representatives of both groups issued a letter of intent regarding the injection and withdrawal of hydrogen with which the planned new thermal power plant at the Anglberg site is to be operated. Operations manager Lothar Schreiber was certain: “The future at this location begins today.” Schreiber and project manager Kristian Enste already had the construction of the new thermal power plant, for which Onyx Power will probably give the go-ahead at the end of this year or the beginning of next year Zollinger municipal council presented.
Reason for the realignment of the "Energiepark Zolling": At present, the coal block is still used to produce a lot of electricity and heat from fossil fuels.
But because the days of hard coal are numbered, but they still want to reliably supply electricity and heat at all times, the new thermal power plant is planned to go into operation in 2024.
This will initially be operated with natural gas, but gradually from 2026 to 2035 the switch to “green” gases and hydrogen - and thus to climate-neutral electricity and heat generation - will take place.
2035 because that is the date by which the district also wants to have achieved the energy transition, and the Anglberg site naturally sees itself as part of the district, emphasized Schreiber.
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His days are numbered: The coal block in Anglberg will soon go offline.
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In order to get to natural gas and hydrogen, of course, you need pipes.
And this is where bayernets comes into play, which is currently in the process of converting its pipeline network to a hydrogen supply.
As Richard Unterseer (Head of Market & Strategy at bayernets) said on Tuesday, the HyPipe Bavaria should be at the end of the efforts and planning.
And the Onyx power plant at Zolling will also be connected via this.
For this purpose, it is planned to branch off a new route north of the state road from the line that is already running past the power plant in the east and then lead it in a southerly direction to the power plant site.
To do this, talks must be held with the property owners and various plans must be made, says Enste.
(By the way: Everything from the region is now also available in our regular Freising newsletter.)
Important: The new route will be dimensioned in such a way that it can also take over the feed-in and feed-out for other systems and projects in Anglberg. Because, according to the vision that Schreiber already has today: the power plant itself generates hydrogen and feeds it into the lines. By then, the planned thermal power plant is expected to produce more than 150,000 megawatt hours of heat per year and will have an efficiency of 92 percent (which is twice as much as the coal block that is currently in operation). What will happen to the coal block cannot be foreseen at the moment, said Schreiber. It is most likely that it will remain in place for an "emergency" so to speak, but will no longer be in operation after the coal phase-out.
The realignment of the Zolling energy park will also have an impact on the workforce: Most of the employees are currently working in and for the coal block, and many of them have "grown old" with this system, according to Schreiber, and will probably then also retire with the coal-fired power plant.
Of course, specialists are needed for the thermal power plant, which is likely to result in the employee structure in the power plant becoming more “fragmented”.
Overall, however, it is assumed that there will be an increased need for employees.
125 people are currently employed in Anglberg.
In any case, good news for the residents of the neighboring communities of Zolling and Haag is that with the decline in coal-fired power generation, truck and train transports will also decrease.
