AREVA was awarded funding by KIC InnoEnergy to develop an innovative bioenergy solution.

AREVA is developing a concept of modular and compact power plants to target small-scale biomass resources and address relatively untapped growth opportunities in Europe, South Asia and Latin America.

AREVA's objective is to combine innovative solutions to optimize small-scale power plant cost for its customers and to reduce construction time. This new concept of biomass plant also aims to improve upstream technologies for multi-fuel acceptance and higher availability.

A number of partners have already signed on to the project along with AREVA, including SITA, leading industrial operator specialist in waste treatment and recovery, as well as R and D centers the French CEA and the German Karlsruhe Institute of Technology.

Bioenergy will play a key role in renewable heat and power production, contributing up to 14% of the European energy mix in 2020. The global market for biomass capacity should grow by 6.8 GWe per year by 2015, with nearly 1.8 GWe per year in each of AREVA's target markets.