News » 22.11.2024 - Thailand: Imaginative use of tulips creates natural gas

Thailand's efforts to better manage its natural gas resources is also delivering an upside for an unlikely floral crop. The country's state-owned energy company, PTT, operates a liquid natural gas terminal in the Mueang Rayong district southeast of Bangkok, receiving offshore gas supplies and super chilling them into more storable liquid natural gas (LNG).

The plant enables the authority to better manage the consistency of supply for electricity generation. However, within the harshly industrial landscape, a greenhouse supports a thriving tulip-growing operation that benefits from the cold energy released once the LNG is "re-gassed" to enable it to be put into the national grid.

The LNG is cooled down and stored at -160degC, but is bought to ambient temperature to return it to its gas form. Often the cold energy released in the process is wasted. But the Thais have found tulips and lilies thrive in the 15degC temperatures the cold energy release can consistently deliver in a large, publicly accessible "coolhouse" facility that uses all-natural lighting.

As part of the SOE's corporate responsibility program, the large coolhouse area is accessible to the public and many come to enjoy the flowers and the lower temperature, roughly half what Thailand's typical hot humid weather sits at.

 

Source: www.floraldaily.com

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