Biogas Journal English Special November 2012

w w w. b i o g a s . o r g

BI

November 2012

German Biogas Association

ZKZ 50073

GAS English SPECIAL EDITION

Country Report: Germany

Biomethane Market F 14

Flexible Biogas Production F 32

Alternative Energy Crops F 38

EDITORIAL

Biogas – a Reliable Energy Carrier The German nuclear power plants will be completely shut down by 2022. With its new energy policy, the Federal Government is going to base the energy supply entirely on renewable energies.

The efforts necessary to accomplish these changes are considerable.

Apart from expanding the capacities to generate power, which the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG) promotes very efficiently, it is now important to reconstruct the infrastructure as well. This cannot only be achieved by building new transmission lines; it also requires the construction of efficient and intelligent energy grids. The challenge of the future is no longer the power distribution, but the interlinking of power generation plants with their predominantly fluctuating feed-in capacities with flexible and less flexible consumers as well as with controllable feeder stations, as reported on page 32.

This can only be achieved, if the power and gas grid are interlinked in an intelligent way, so that the transport and in-feed capacities of both grids can be optimally exploited.

Biogas and biomethane are the only types of gas with a regenerative origin available that are available today. These energy carriers therefore play an important role in implementing the energy change.

Biogas can provide power and heat in accordance with the demand and will thus make a major contribution to the energy change. In order to utilize the special features of biogas to their full extent, it is now required to create such general conditions that will stimulate investments into the necessary infrastructure.

The 7,200 biogas plants currently existing in Germany could replace about nine conventional gas and thermal power plants, if they were operated with an average of 3,000 full load hours a year.

When generating electricity on site, biogas plants must empty their gas storage tanks once a day, i.e. these plants can replace the daily load.

Biomethane fed into the gas grid can be stored in existing storage facilities for natural gas over long periods of time and will thus be available as fuel for combined heat and power plants or gas-fueled power plants at any time as the demand arises.

Once fed into the gas grid, biomethane can, of course, also be used as highly efficient biofuel in cars, buses or trucks.

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

In this English issue of the Biogas Journal you will find practical examples of biogas projects which have been implemented in the meantime. Their location close to the site of the actual biogas production is an important factor. Another significant factor for the use of biogas is the cultivation of energy plants, as referred to on pages 38-51. In the past eight ears, some highly efficient cultivation, harvesting and preservation techniques have been developed that have turned the biogas plants into an important and additional source of revenue in the agricultural sector.

At the moment, a lot of discussions in the entire bio-energy sector are focusing on the energy plants. The EU Commission is just in the process of drafting regulations aimed at reducing the expansion targets for biofuel from ten to five per cent via the Renewable Energy Directive (EU 2009/28) and the Biofuel Quality Directive (2009/30).

The allegedly poor ecological balance of biofuels is cited as reason for these attempts. This ecological balance has been derived from scientifically doubtful accounting factors for an assumed land-use change (indirect landuse change (ILUC)) due to the cultivation of energy plants.

Such deliberations are extremely dangerous for the bioenergy sector, since an attempt is made on the basis of perceived negative effects and dubious assumptions to strangle an industrial sector that has a major share in the energy supply for the heat, fuel and power sector. Public discussions currently center only around restrictions in the fuel sector.

However, should the ILUC approach currently pursued by the Commission prevail, i.e. should the image of biofuel be damaged by dubious calculations, it will not take very long before all other utilization areas of bioenergy are subjected to drastic restrictions. The bioenergy sector must therefore unite its forces and show clearly that the change to a sustainable and reliable energy supply can only be accomplished, and will only work, with and not without bioenergy.

Sincerely yours, Dr. Claudius da Costa Gomez Managing Director of the German Biogas Association

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CONTENTS

Editorial Dr. Claudius da Costa Gomez

...............................................

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Crushing and Injecting

By Dierk Jensen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Berlin goes Biogas

By Thomas Gaul . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Feeding in of Biomethane Does not Gain Enough Momentum

By Dipl.-Ing. agr. (FH) Martin Bensmann . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Technical Assistant NawaRo

By Angelika Sontheimer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Hot Air Fills the Coffers

By Steffen Bach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Turning Liquid Manure into Water

By Dipl.-Ing. agr. Andrea Horbelt

........................................

28

“An Important Step towards a More Sustainable Energy Supply”

By Martin Frey

......................................................................

14

32

Colour Into the Field

Stripes in Bloom from Flensburg to Oberstdorf

By Dr. Stefan Rauh and Dipl. Wirtschaftsing. (FH) Marion Wiesheu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

Sugar Beets on the Outskirts of the Ruhr Area

By Thomas Gaul . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Energy from Wild Plants – the Research Gains Momentum

By Dr. Birgit Vollrath . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Composite Plants May Displace Maize

By Andrea Biertümpfel, Michael Conrad, Wolf-Dieter Blüthner . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

About Lies Concerning the Energy Change, the Power Prices and the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG)

By Dipl.-Ing. agr. Bastian Olzem

.........................................

32

52

22nd Annual BIOGAS Convention and Trade Exhibition in Leipzig, 29-31 January 2013 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56 European Biogas Association – EBA

Strong advocacy in Brussels

COVERPHOTO: LIPP GMBH | PHOTOS: WWW.LANDPIXEL.DE, MARTIN FREY, ANTJE WERNER

24 Countries – 27 National Organisations – 27 Companies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

42 Publisher: German Biogas Association General Manager Dr. Claudius da Costa Gomez (Person responsible according to German press law) Andrea Horbelt (editorial support) Angerbrunnenstraße 12 D-85356 Freising Phone +49 81 61 98 46 60 Fax: +49 81 61 98 46 70 e-mail: info@biogas.org Internet: www.biogas.org

Editor: Martin Bensmann German Biogas Association Phone +49 54 09 9 06 94 26 e-mail: martin.bensmann@biogas.org Advertising management: bigbenreklamebureau GmbH An der Surheide 29 D-28870 Ottersberg-Fischerhude Phone +49 42 93 890 89-0 Fax: +49 42 93 890 89-29 e-mail: info@bb-rb.de

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

Layout: bvw werbeagentur Möserstraße 27 D-49074 Osnabrück e-mail: office@bvw-werbeagentur.de Printing: Druckhaus Fromm, Osnabrück Circulation: 3,500

The newspaper, and all articles contained within it, are protected by copyright.

Articles with named authors represent the opinion of the author, which does not necessarily coincide with the position of the German Biogas Association. Reprinting, recording in databases, online services and the internet, reproduction on data carriers such as CD-ROMs is only permitted after written agreement. Any articles received by the editor’s office assume agreement with complete or partial publication.

5

ENGLISH SPECIAL

Crushing and Injecting “Panta rhei”, or all things are in flux: The mill construction firm Tietjen Verfahrenstechnik is currently creating a furore in the field of wet substrate processing with their novel technique by the name of Imprasyn.

By Dierk Jensen

All in all a question of perspective: Biogas production in Hermannshof shown from its most colourful side.

“I

dreamt of the cockpit,” Reimer Tietjen tells us about his plans as a youngster, but it came to nothing.

Instead of rising into the air he has remained on the ground and took over the mill construction firm his father had established in Hemdingen/Holstein. The first activities of today‘s company can be traced back to the 1920s, when the grandfather constructed his first hammer mill on his native farmyard.

Somewhat later, this venture developed into a fodder mill, from which an independent mill construction firm branched off in 1959.

After more than fifty years of business activities, Tietjen Verfahrenstechnik GmbH can be proud of its success: Some 1,800 grinding facilities with hammer mills of various types, which are forged and produced by the currently 30 staff members in the Hemdingen Works, can be found in 65 countries of the world, the capacities ranging from eleven kilowatts (kW) to 500 kW. There is no doubt: The firm is very familiar with the disintegration of biomass. No wonder, they have gained a wealth of experience

6

in this segment. The milling plants designed and built in the past were mainly employed in the fodder production and by distilleries.

But not just that: A short glance into the laboratory reveals an impressive range of products that are ground in the Tietjen mills. Several hundred grinding samples, including wood, flax, miscanthus, rape, rye, rice and cocoa, are sorted neatly and tidily in bags in the archive.

Research for the Optimal Combination of Mechanics and Biology Some drawers are marked with the word “Biogas”. “Since 2005, we have focused part of our research on finding suitable techniques to improve the disintegration of substrates in biogas plants”, Tietjen tells us in his light-flooded office, where a black grand piano reveals that the boss is a lover of music. “We have invested a lot of money into our research which is, above all, concentrating on the optimal combination of mechanics and biology”, Tietjen – who was trained

as a machine fitter before he studied aircraft engineering – underlines when he talks about the costly project his medium-sized company dares to implement.

But the long and effortful research work seems to have been worth its while, because Tietjen has, in the meantime, patented the new technique for the grinding or crushing (“Prallen”) of biogas substrates in a hammer mill, an in-house development known under the name of “Imprasyn”. In other words: it is a wet-type substrate processing technique, which opens up solids and liquids synchronously down to their cell structure in a simple way and adds biotechnological additives in one work step. This process creates a fermentation ambience, in which the methane bacteria feel so good that they are encouraged to achieve a top performance. “We expect an efficiency increase of between 15 and 20 per cent, when applying our technique”, Tietjen says. If this really becomes true, this new biological/technical combination could turn out to be a milestone for the entire biogas sector that is still so young.

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

But where is the secret of this innovation?

“The crucial thing is the synchronous crushing and injecting the substrate with liquid,” he explains. “While the hammer mill homogenizes the substrate mechanically, the spraying with the additives as well as the input of liquid will result in a drastic decrease of viscosity.” The resultant positive effect is that the substrate flows easier and can be mixed better, so that the agitators need to work less.

Apart from that, the technique prevents the formation of floating layers, because the gas will rise naturally, even under high digester loads, due to a change in the interfacial tension. The pump pressure is dropping at the same time, the resistance in the piping system is decreasing and, proportionally, also the pumps’ energy consumption. All this sounds very intriguing. But will the promise stand the test in practice? Because you cannot get Tietjen’s innovation for nothing: The component costs, depending on the location and the size of the plant, between 80,000 and 170,000 Euros, Tietjen admits quite frankly.

This sum has not turned away the Beckmann brothers from Hermannshof, a small village between Stralsund and Rostock in Mecklenburg, where the patented Imprasyn system from Holstein has been operated since spring 2011. Ralf and Raimar Beckmann grew typical field crops on their 700 hectares of land until 2006, before they dared to start generating biogas, after the grain prices had soared forever.

Since then, the two brothers have upgraded their plant in three steps with three Jenbacher gas engines with an output of 526 kW each. While the waste heat of two combined heat and power units (CHP) cogeneration plants that are located on the farmyard is used for drying split logs or grain, the third module, in its capacity as a satellite CHP, supplies the houses in the nearby village of Hermannshof with power and heat. Two large maize silos and a beetroot bunker behind them right in front of the biogas plant point to the fact that the fodder consists exclusively of sugar beet (100 hectares) and maize (700 hectares, of which 350 hectares are additionally purchased).

PHOTOGRAPHS: DIERK JENSEN

Special Additives Being Used

The 75-kW hammer mill that is installed on the Beckmanns‘ farmyard.

Grinding 30 Minutes per Hour “Listen, it starts growling now,” Raimar Beckmann says in his small container, when suddenly the relatively small hammer mill with its capacity of 75 kW starts moving and rotating. Located next to the filling auger BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

F

7

ENGLISH SPECIAL

Reimer Tietjen allows an insight in the production of hammer mills in his Hemdingen Works.

and the two fermenters, it is operated 30 min in each hour. The hammer mill is filled with one third of fresh mass and two thirds of recirculated material which is pumped from the main fermenters.

“But we have the option to feed it exclusively with the recirculated material from the fer-

Raimar Beckmann in front of the fermenters of his biogas plant.

menters,” Beckmann explains, “so as to optimize the fermentation process in the re-fermentation tank, depending on the type of input materials.” And he goes on: “If we use a lot of sugar beet in the main fermenter”, the 44-year old agricultural engineer says, “they will be available, or fermented, faster

Acreage can be saved The diary of the plant with the figures of the material fed in (data from other plants have been available in the meantime) shows a reduction in the daily quantities of raw material. If this reduction was converted into acreage, quite a few hectares (see table) would no longer be required for the cultivation of regrowing raw materials (preferably maize). In the case of Raimar Beckmann, it is even 115 hectares of maize less which he now requires.

Example of the possible consumption of acreage of a 526-kW plant depending on the yield Raw gas

at

t/FM/à

€35/t

ha

2,277,600 Nm3

180 Nm3

€ 12,653

442,867

281

2,277,600 Nm3

200 Nm3

€ 11,388

398,580

253

3

2,277,600 Nm

210 Nm3

€ 10,848

379,600

241

2,277,600 Nm3

220 Nm3

€ 10,353

362,345

230

2,277,600 Nm3

230 Nm3

€ 9,903

346,591

220

3

2,277,600 Nm

240 Nm3

€ 9,490

332,150

211

2,277,600 Nm3

250 Nm3

€ 9,110

311,864

201

2,277,600 Nm3

260 Nm3

€ 8,760

306,600

195

The technique also provides the potential to utilize raw materials in biogas plants that have, so far, not been used at all or the use of which has not been viable economically. The high share of straw (which cannot be fermented without being pre-treated) prevented the utilization of certain types of manure as compared with the energy yield achieved from maize. Such raw materials will further reduce the acreage in the future.

Source: www.biogas-akademie.de

8

than maize components. When we now feed 100 per cent of this recirculated material into the hammer mill and add, at the same time, the liquid additive, prime-stock methane bacteria from the deep sea enriched with trace elements, and subsequently pump the whole thing into the refermentation tanks, we can increase the biogas production.”

More facts are “tabled” in the office, also a container, where we are served coffee and delicious gooseberry cream cake. “We have fed our plant with 26.2 t of dry mass a day before we had the Tietjen component installed. Now we need only 22.5 t a day”, Raimar Beckmann says very pleasedly and enters the relevant figures into his pocket calculator once again, just to check. “Yes, this is correct”, he adds. This means in terms of the maize fermented so far in the plant, that the two operators achieve the same result with an acreage reduced by 115 hectares! However, this must be contrasted with a higher energy input which has risen by about one per cent (as regards internal consumption).

Fermentation Process Can Be Controlled More Flexibly Although the Beckmanns do not disclose the purchase price of the plant, their judgement after a few months of gaining operating experience is fairly clear. “Altogether, our plant runs much more smoothly and evenly with the biological/technical component.

Before its installation, we had to agitate ourBIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

The open sugar beet bunker is filled and emptied with the wheel loader. The bunker is clad with thick foil, similar to a storage tank for liquid manure.

selves once a week and were faced with blockages. All this is now past history. Besides, we can control the fermentation process and the load management more flexibly than before”, Beckmann confirms.

The improved flowability in the fermenter might also have a positive impact on the diversity in the fields in the long run. While fibrous energy plants occasionally caused difficulties, feeding in grass or even cup-plants seems conceivable now. Although longterm data are not available as yet, the Beckmanns can recommend the innovation from Hemdingen with a clear conscience. They assume that this investment will be paid off in three years already.

Should this be confirmed and should it be possible to significantly increase the efficiency with the help of this technique, it will show once more what other development potentials the biogas technology still holds. Despite all the efforts made so far, the biogas sector is only in its infancy. It is always said that the processes in a biogas fermenter are the same as in the digestive tract of a cow. Although this may be true by and large, the stomachs of a cow are still much more efficient than the biogas plants of the current generation. If the biogas sector, which believes in machines so much, wants to grow further it is well advised to have more regard to biology and nature than now. Both are sensitive.

Tietjen, by the way, being fully aware of this, considers his innovation a contribution that “may help closing the nutrient circuit.

Only if we succeed in this, we can be successful with bioenergy in the long run.” D

Author Dierk Jensen Freelance journalist Bundesstr. 76 · H-20144 Hamburg Phone: 00 49 40 401 46 889 Mobile: 00 49 1 72 4 53 45 47 e-mail: dierk.jensen@gmx.de BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

Berlin goes Biogas Biogas will make Berlin greener. After all, the city has a considerable potential of biomass that can be used as an energy source. This biomass does not consist of specially cultivated energy plants, but residual and waste materials are used as a source for sustainable biogas generation.

By Thomas Gaul

areas. Most of this material is currently composted, but the composting process releases greenhouse gases, and the energy contained in the biomass is wasted. Making better use of the biomass would mean that Berlin would reduce its CO2 emissions by up to 230,700 tons per year. This is the result of a study commissioned by the environmental department of the Berlin Senate.

Now, however, Berlin is moving full steam ahead: BSR is building a biogas plant that can convert all “bio-material” from Berlin households into clean energy in Ruhleben.

Biogas transformed into biomethane has

also become an important option for GASAG, the local gas supplier. On 8 September 2009, its subsidiary EMB (Energie Mark Brandenburg) commissioned its treatment facility in Rathenau and started its production of biomethane.

By the end of 2010, around 55 million kilowatt hours (kWh) had been generated. In addition to the power needed for plant operation, the combined heat and power plant (CHP) has fed around 4.4 million kWh into the public grid. Around half of the biomethane produced in Rathenow is added to the fuel in natural gas filling stations all over

gas treatment gas storage tank fermenter company building

aerobization treatment hall biofilter incoming goods hall

d roa h c roa app

app roa ch roa d

gas grid access station

The future appearance of the biomethane plant of Berliner Stadtreinigung.

10

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

PHOTOGRAPH: STEFFEN SIEGMUND, BSR

A

round 1.2 million tons of biogenic waste are accumulated in Berlin every year. On the one hand, this is gardening waste from the maintenance of parks and cemeteries, but above all the contents of organic waste containers. Around 60,000 tons of this “bio-material”, as it is called by the Berliner Stadtreinigung (Berlin Cleaning Service – BSR) are collected from households, ranging from kitchen waste via foliage and lawn cuttings up to deep-frying fat from restaurants.

Another 45,000 tons of lawn cuttings result from the maintenance of parks and green

Berlin. The biogas share is at around 20 per cent. With 19 natural gas filling stations Berlin occupies a leading position in Germany. This is also reflected in the number of vehicles that can be fuelled with natural gas or biomethane.

PHOTO: GASAG

ENGLISH SPECIAL

GASAG Increases Biomethane Sales In the meantime, 4,200 of such vehicles are on the road with the letter B (Berlin) on their number plates. The operators of the 13 GASAG filling stations can use the biomethane from Rathenow to meet their biofuel quotas. According to Otto Berthold, head of the GASAG environment and technology department, GASAG’s biomethane sales rose from 5.4 million kWh in 2009 to 21.7 million kWh in 2010. Berthold thinks that with rising natural gas prices the price difference to biomethane will become smaller.

This means that biomethane prices would also become attractive for private customers.

After all, around 22 million kWh are supplied to GASAG customers and to smaller public utilities every year. This includes Stadtwerke Hennigsdorf in the Westhavelland district; they use the climate-friendly energy source in a CHP to produce heat and electricity. Further supplies are sold to operators of smaller CHPs such as Stadtwerke Premnitz GmbH. In Rathenow the gas is processed in a “Biogas Upgrader” manufactured by Haase Energietechnik in Neumünster. An organic washing solution is applied under pressure and at low temperatures to bind carbon dioxide, hydrogen sulfide and water vapor from 1,130 standard cubic meters (scm) of raw biogas per hour. Farmers located in an area 20 km around the plant supply the substrate required and take back the nearly 37,000 tons of fermentation residues.

GASAG biomethane plant in Rathenow.

GASAG Plans Further Biomethane Plants Part of the heat required in the plant is produced in a CHP operated with the biogas generated in Rathenow. In the context of its biogas strategy, GASAG plans to build further biomethane feed-in plants in the Berlin/Brandenburg region until 2015. With this strategy, the Berlin gas supplier is also fulfilling part of the climate protection program “Berlin verpflichtet”, that has set itself the target of reducing CO2 emissions in Berlin by one million tons per year by 2015.

This, however, will only work if private customers become involved as well. Within the gas tariff “GASAG-Bio 10” they can buy conventional natural gas with a mixture of ten per cent biomethane. With a monthly base price of € 15.99 this tariff is considerably more expensive than the company’s “Comfort Tariff” of € 6.55. This means the number of customers remains small, and Dr. Klaus Haschker, head of the GASAG communication department, comments: “Unfortunately we do not even have 1,000 customers.”

Feed-in plants for biomethane in Berlin Plant

Rathenow

Schwedt/Oder

Ruhleben

Operator

GASAG

GASAG

BSR

Commissioning date

08.09.2009

18.11.2011

mid-2013 expected

Feed-in capacity

575 Nm³/h

700 Nm³/h

500 Nm³/h

Processing technique organic washing

pressureless amine scrubbing

pressureless amine scrubbing

Substrate

maize, rye whole plant, silage (GPS), liquid manurefrom pigs and cattle

maize, grass, rye GPS

biowaste

Input quantity

approx. 40,000 t/a

approx. 65,000 t/a

60,000 t/a

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

Nevertheless Haschker remains a supporter of biomethane: “We will continue working on this.” Another gas feed-in plant was commissioned in Schwedt (a town on the river Oder) on November 18, 2011. Every hour, 700 scm of biomethane are fed in at the New Harbour in Schwedt. This corresponds to the consumption of around 2,500 private households. Maize, grass and WCCS cereals are used. The raw biogas is treated to achieve natural gas quality using non-pressurized amine washing; subsequently the gas is fed into the EWE network as biogas.

MT-Energie was the general contractor in this project and performed all construction work ranging from the earthwork up to the construction of the biogas plant and the gas processing facility. Haschker says that another plant will be connected to the grid in mid-2012: “The Neudorf plant is an existing biogas plant that will be retrofitted to be suitable for gas feed-in.”

Advertising for Green CHP The decentralized use of CHPs is an important field of biomethane use. Efficiencies of more than 90 per cent can be achieved through the combined production of power and heat. The Berlin Energy Agency is in charge of the project “CHP Goes Green”, co-funded by the European Union. The aim of the project is to use the “green” CHP motto to inform the public of the advantages of using renewable energies in combination with CHPs and to promote good practice examples.

GASAG and the Urban Development Department of the Berlin Senate are partners of the three-year project. For instance, a biomethane fuelled CHP has been built for the Berlin fire-fighters near the Charlottenburg Nord fire station. The plant com- F

11

PHOTO: GASAG

ENGLISH SPECIAL

offered to the tenants at a favourable price.

The company plans to extend this offer to more tenants and other customer groups in the long term.

More than 2,000 Mini-CHPs Possible

GASAG biomethane plant in Schwedt.

missioned in December 2010 has a capacity of 240 kWel and a thermal output of 365 kW. The biomethane comes from Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt, and Mecklenburg-Pomerania. The plant is operated by the Berlin Energy Agency as contractor.

Another concept in this area is the “GASAG climate power plant”. The gas supplier, working together with the Berlin Housing Management Agency, has installed CHPs in blocks of flats, supplying the buildings with heat. The power generated is simultaneously

The potential of mini-CHPs is especially great in Berlin since out of the 1.88 million dwellings in Berlin, 1.69 million are in blocks of flats. It is planned to increase the de-centralized energy supply altogether from between 400 and 500 plants now to more than 2,200 plants in the future.

It is not only with small power plants in the boiler room, but also with large-scale facilities that Berlin is making progress. “Now we start working at full speed,” Thomas Rückert, project manager with BSR, says. The permit process for the plant took as long as 20 months, the reason being that it was necessary to carry out an environmental impact test as well as to investigate the potential 2.7 hectare site (located within the city) for possible contamination.

Now a dry fermentation plant which will annually convert 60,000 tons of “bio-material” from households into biogas is under construction. The contract has been

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BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

awarded to Strabag Umwelttechnik in Dresden. The two horizontal fermenters made of special concrete work in a single-stage, i.e. the “quasi-continuous” plug flow process.

According to Rücker, the dry substance content in the fermenter will be between 20 and 25 per cent. The hygienization of the material will be carried out directly in the fermenter as the plant will be operated in a thermophilic manner at temperatures above 55 degrees Centigrade.

The mean hydraulic retention time will be 23 days. The fermentation residues – also called fermentation products – will be used as fertilizers in agriculture. The operators expect an annual output of 13,400 tons of solid aerated fermentation products and 32,200 tons of liquid fermentation products.

These products substitute the compost which was produced from most of the biowaste in the past.

Lower Greenhouse Gas Emissions At Ruhleben, too, the biogas is processed into biomethane. The process is also based on non-pressurized amine washing developed by MT-Energie. Thomas Rücker specifically stresses one advantage: “Methane slip is very low.” There are intensive discussions

now in many municipalities about avoiding CO2 emissions during composting or fermentation. The environmental department of the Berlin Senate stresses that these relevant greenhouse gas emissions will be considerably reduced when new fermentation plants are built.

The main focus here is on reducing methane emissions because one kilogram of methane means releasing a CO2 equivalent of 25 kilograms. Those in charge at BSR think that the advantage achieved with fermentation amounts to approximately 50 to 100 kilograms. Commissioning is planned for the spring of 2013 and it is expected that in mid2013, when the first gas will start flowing, the environment will be spared at least 5,000 tons of CO2 per year.

On the occasion of the symbolic groundbreaking ceremony, Katrin Lompscher, Berlin‘s former environmental senator, pointed out: “This biogas plant will bring Berlin to the top, because we are the first big city in Germany processing its bio-waste in a climate-friendly way on such a large scale.”

The new road taken up by BSR in terms of biogas use will also contribute to climate protection. The biomethane will be used to fuel the refuse collection trucks collecting

the “bio-material” on the roads of Berlin.

The fleet currently comprises 90 natural gasdriven trucks which will be fuelled with biomethane in the future. In the medium term, their number will be increased to 150 when old diesel-fuelled trucks are scrapped. This would mean that 60 per cent of the entire fleet will be operated with biomethane.

“Apart from the plant’s own consumption, each kWh produced will be used to fuel our vehicles,” Thomas Rücker says. This means that 2.5 million tons of diesel will be substituted. Rücker stresses further advantages for the Berlin population: “The vehicles cause less noise and do not produce harmful particulate matter.” D

Author Thomas Gaul Free-lance journalist Im Wehrfeld 19a · D-30989 Gehrden Mobile: 00 49 1 72 5 12 71 71 e-mail: gaul-gehrden@t-online.de

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13

Feeding in of Miomethane Does not Gain Enough Momentum The speed of increasing the in-feed of biomethane into the natural gas grid is too low. At such a low speed, the Federal Government’s target for 2020 cannot be attained. What is missing are a well-functioning market and reasonable general legal conditions.

By Dipl.-Ing. agr. (FH) Martin Bensmann

L

ast year, the feed-in of biomethane into the German gas grid made more progress than in the years before. In 2011 alone, 29 new feed-in stations were linked to the natural gas grid, i.e. ten plants more than in 2010. At the moment, there are 80 plants that feed biomethane into the natural gas grid (status: April 2012). Their locations are distributed all over Germany.

The raw gas processing capacity of these plants ranges from 500 to 5,500 standard cubic metres (scm) per hour.

Three of the plants feed gas from waste processing plants into the natural gas grid, the others produce biomethane from regrowing

14

raw materials. Twelve plants run the raw biogas through a so-called amine scrubbing process, seven use pressure scrubbing for processing the gas, five pressure swing adsorption and four an organic/physical scrubbing process. The overall raw gas processing capacity rose by 30,600 scm/h in 2011.

This year three new feed-in stations, of which two use pressure scrubbing and one amine scrubbing for the gas treatment, have already been connected with the gas grid.

Their raw gas processing capacity amounts to a total of 2,600 scm/h. The entire raw gas processing capacity installed in Germany at

the moment amounts to 88,675 scm/h.

Given an average of 8,000 operating hours per year, the 80 plants that are connected with the gas grid could process some 709.4 million m³ of raw biogas.

Biomethane replaces three per cent of the indigenous natural gas production If one assumes an average methane content of 52 per cent in the raw biogas, because the overwhelming number of the plants ferments regrowing raw materials, a total of 368.8 million m³ of biomethane could be fed into the German natural gas grid every year.

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

PHOTOGRAPHS: WWW.LANDPIXEL.DE

ENGLISH SPECIAL

ENGLISH SPECIAL

This is equivalent to three per cent of the current domestic natural gas production.

Besides, this quantity would be sufficient to fully cover the demand of approx. 1,053,942 German households (with a consumption of 3,500 kWh p.a.).

Despite the dynamic increase in new feedin capacities in 2011, it is obvious that the Federal Government’s target for 2020, i.e. to feed six billion cubic metres of biomethane into the natural gas grid, will probably not be attained. In order to be able to still attain this target by 2020, 150 new feedin stations would now have to be erected every year. And the target figure even rises to ten billion cubic metres by 2030.

According to the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Energiebilanzen e.V. (AGEB), the consumption of natural gas in Germany dropped by almost 13 per cent to 2,733 petajoule, or to about 760 billion kWh in 2011, as compared with 2010. Despite the positive effects from the economy, the temperatures during the heating period, which were higher than in the previous year, let the sales in the heat market decrease. The supplies of natural gas in Germany dropped by four per cent to 1,062 billion kWh in 2011 as compared with the previous year. As in 2010, eleven per cent of that volume were produced in Germany and 89 per cent imported.

According to the information provided by the Wirtschaftsverband Erdöl- und Erdgasgewinnung e.V., the domestic production amounted to 120 billion kWh last year. Germany‘s imports of natural gas decreased by four per cent. Russia remained the most important supplier, its share in Germany’s consumption of natural gas rose slightly to 31 per cent (2010: 29 per cent). Norway‘s share amounted to 28 per cent as in the year before. The Dutch share dropped from 22 per cent in 2010 to 21 per cent. The remaining nine per cent are distributed between Denmark, Britain and other countries (2010: ten per cent). Slightly more than two thirds of the natural gas consumed in Germany had its origin in Western Europe.

Difficult Sales Market One of the German biomethane producers is Horst Seide, managing director of Kraft und Stoff Dannenberg GmbH & Co.KG. “The sales market for biomethane is difficult, but it is going to pick up slowly,” Seide describes the situation. He markets his biomethane not only through the natural gas grid, but also operates his own biomethane filling pump, one of the few in Germany.

Among the customers supplied by Seide via BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

the natural gas grid are the operators of two combined heat and power plants (CHP) that changed from vegetable oil to biomethane.

Other customers are a deep-freeze company and a contractor who runs a CHP in Hamburg.

These marketing channels have completely exhausted his sales capacity. The biomethane he sells at his filling pump is certified pursuant to the (German) Biofuel Sustainability Directive. Seide cooperates with REDcert, while GUTcert supervises whether he complies with the directives. “My biomethane has no problems at all to satisfy the requirements because I ferment waste from spice plants,” Seide says.

Many more complications were caused by the in-depth inspections his entire company was subjected to. He had to create a CO2 balance for his company, to name just one example. Since standard values for such calculations do not exist, he has calculated the balance himself. In doing so, he has gone through the entire production chain from the point where the spice plant waste is generated to the final product. Seide proudly comments: “My biomethane fuel saves 87 per cent of CO2 as compared with fossil fuel, although this figure does not even contain certain “credits”. Because in former times, the waste was simply returned to the fields.

When being disintegrated organically, the waste emitted climate gas. Since that does not happen any longer now, I can claim a credit for avoiding the generation of climatically detrimental gas. It is, however, not quite clear yet what quantity we are talking about.”

Mineral Oil Companies Purchase Biomethane in a Move to Reach Their Quota For quite some time now even small mineral oil companies have been purchasing biomethane from him in a move to reach their biofuel quota. “They do it because they haven’t sold enough E10 fuel or biodiesel,” the entrepreneur adds. The quota works as follows: Seide sells his in-house produced biomethane as fuel. In doing so he can choose whether he claims the tax concessions for biomethane or not. If not, he pays tax amounting to 1.39 cents /kW. Seide is then entitled to participate in the quota trade.

The level of the quota depends on the volume of kW he has sold. According to rule of thumb, one kilogram of biomethane is equivalent to 13.7 kW, which he has put on the market and on which he must pay tax.

The quota is actually traded in megajoule, but that can be converted into kW. “I have sold the quota via the Berlin-based platform Initiative erdgas mobil, which offers the trade in quotas. Hence, when I have sold one kilogram of biomethane, I have generated a 13.7-kg quota,” Seide explains. Those who market fuel are so-called “quota obligors”, i.e. parties liable to market 6.25 per cent of their fuel in the form of biofuel.

A special feature is that Seide is eligible for “double counting”, which may sound rather complicated but means the following: If one markets biomethane and complies with the Biofuel Sustainability Directive, the biomethane quantity marketed will be “accounted for” at the simple rate. On August 15, 2011 the Bundesanstalt für Landwirtschaft und Ernährung (Federal Agency for Agriculture and Food) notified the certification systems that Article 7 “Double weighting of certain biofuels” became effective, when the Directive for Implementing the Biofuel Quota Regulations (36th BImSchV) was amended. This means that the relevant biomethane quantity will now account twice towards the quota, provided waste is used as a raw material for biofuel production.

Active Search for Heat Sinks Another participant in the biomethane market is Bernd Hugenroth, managing director of both energielenker GmbH and Klimakönner GmbH. Both companies have their registered address at the Airport Center II in the airport of Münster/Osnabrück near Greven. He founded both companies in early 2011. energielenker GmbH with its currently ten employees generates decentralized energy from biogas CHPs that are fueled with biomethane only. “We aim only at locations, where heat-driven CHPs are run under full load between 5,500 and 6,000 hours per year. We are actively searching for these heat sinks in the health, foodstuff and other industrial sectors,” Hugenroth explains.

The current main competitors of biomethane are plants operated under the Combined Heat and Power Act (KWKG), which means that locations with CHPs fueled with natural gas and with a high rate of using the power generated for their own purposes, as has been made possible under the KWKG, clearly outclass the biomethane-fueled CHPs under economic aspects. Hugenroth needs projects, where heat dominates the consumption structure and power plays only a minor role. The F

15

ENGLISH SPECIAL

energy supplier points to CHP capacities of between 250 and 2,500 kW. “A location with a capacity of less than 250 kW is no longer viable, since the heat price would then have to exceed seven cents/kWh, which is eventually not competitive,” the head of energielenker GmbH calculates.

The company acts as contractor (supplier) and assumes responsibility for the local energy supply. energielenker GmbH is thus CHP operator and district heat operator at local level at the same time. Under the 2004 and 2009 Renewable Energy Sources Acts (EEG) the biomethane is bought from traders, under the EEG 2012 the gas directly from feed-in stations. In order to be licensed for business all over Germany, energielenker GmbH operates within so-called balancing groups in all market areas.

Biomethane Purchases Directly from the Producer Hugenroth explains: “Before the EEG 2012, the older gas has usually been sold already to a trader over a period of ten years. The banks require this kind of security, as otherwise they wouldn’t finance the feed-in stations. However, the biomethane from the

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traders is usually slightly more expensive than that from the feed-in stations themselves. In the case of direct purchases we save the trader’s margin.” The Greven-based company also offers 10-year contracts for its biomethane purchases, since their contracts usually also have a term of ten years.

Hugenroth sees obstacles in the biomethane production and marketing above all under economic aspects. “If one negotiates with, or talks to, the gas grid operators or the traders on an equal footing, everything will normally run smoothly. Sometimes they try setting up hurdles, but there are clear regulations. Occasionally you have to involve a lawyer who will then explain what the law says.” But energielenker GmbH does not only purchase biomethane. They also help biogas producers to acces the gas grid. “But we do not invest into biogas plants as such,” Hugenroth clarifies. At the moment, Hugenroth has contracted a total capacity of five megawatts, at the end of this year it will probably be ten megawatts.

The business target of Klimakönner GmbH is totally different. Apart from mixed products generated from biomethane and natural gas, they also market pure biomethane for

gas-fired boilers. Klimakönner GmbH is a sales platform selling products to climateconscious customers. “We supply mixed gas products both to end consumers and to companies like the Stadtwerke (municipal utilities). Our prices are calculated strictly on the basis of the feed-out prices charged in the individual postcode areas,” Hugenroth emphasizes. A database in the background makes it possible to calculate razor-sharp prices. Apart from biomethane, Klimakönner GmbH also purchases natural gas and balances the structure between both. In this case, the biomethane has exclusively been generated from waste and foodstuff residues, so that it can be burnt in boilers. Customers buying a minimum quantity of 5,000 kW can purchase from Klimakönner GmbH, with the purchases being handled directly on the internet platform.

The Market Does not Pick Up Lars Klinkmüller, spokesperson of the Arbeitskreis Gaseinspeisung in the German Biogas Association, deplores that there is still no functioning biomethane market in Germany. The market does not pick up for various reasons. Although the German gas

industry has once committed itself to use ten per cent of biomethane in the fuel sector, the reality shows that hardly any quantities of that kind are used in this sector. “We have checked the calculations of that time and found out that three or four larger feedin stations can attain the target of this self-commitment. This is no market today, where large quantities would be handled,” Klinkmüller says.

He is, above all, irritated about the fact that biomethane does not find its way into the stock of old(er) buildings. “I say, any cubic metre of biomethane which can be fed into the natural gas grid will shift natural gas back into the deposits. And this is what matters. Each and any application of biomethane must be considered as a progress,” Klinkmüller says, convinced of his view.

From his point of view, an Act on FeedingIn Gas from Renewable Raw Materials would give the market a new impetus. “Such a law would be a reasonable instrument to promote a functioning gas market.”

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ENGLISH SPECIAL

Development of the raw gas processing capacity in standard cubic metres per hour in Germany.

SOURCE: GERMAN BIOGAS ASSOCIATION

Annual amount

Cumulative amount

Annual development of the feed-in stations in Germany since 2006.

SOURCE: GERMAN BIOGAS ASSOCIATION

panies, introduced the draft of an Act on Feeding-In and Storing Gas from Renewable Raw Materials (EEGasG) during a socalled Parliamentary Evening in Berlin. In the meantime, a proposal for a draft bill has also been put forward by the lawyers’ firm of Becker Büttner Held.

The time until this day has also been used to introduce the EEGasG to, and discuss it with, politicians as well as representatives of firms and associations. The approach to pay remuneration – at calculable conditions – for gas generated from renewable resources (such as biomethane or hydrogen from wind power) that is fed into the natural gas grid has been basically assessed posi-

18

tively by most of the people involved. The resultant differential costs are to be added to the power prices.

The question about the (economic) costs of a new allocation system has been asked quite often, as could be expected. It became obvious fairly quickly that arguments in favour of the EEGasG would be likely to fall on deaf ears among politicians and the Federal Government without an independent study about the expected costs of the EEGasG. The German Renewable Energy Association (BEE) and the German Windenergy Association also consider a cost study on the EEGasG an important milestone in the efforts of pursuing the draft bill

any further. It was for this reason that the supporters of the EEGasG, or of the EEGasG cost study, respectively, held a meeting in Berlin on April 5. Offers from competent institutions had been obtained prior to this event. The 18 participants of the meeting, representatives of the biogas and wind power industries as well from the three associations FvB, BEE and BWE, discussed the necessary contents of such a study and the offers obtained. It was also discussed how to raise funds for financing the cost study. Although it has been possible to get promises for quite a considerable amount at the meeting, there is still a funding gap that needs to be closed.

The companies are therefore hereby asked to make a contribution to the funding of this cost study. Since this “supporters meeting” has only been the first one of its kind, other parties are herewith invited to also support the funding of the study and to suggest topics to be dealt with. Against the background of the immense challenges arising from continuously increasing shares in renewable power – especially from fluctuating sources – it is urgently required to activate the huge storage system under the name of “natural gas grid” for renewable energies. A new EEGasG would be the key to it.

The EEGasG cost study will be embedded into the system transformation platform of the BEE. This platform is to show – on the basis of own studies – the information compiled from studies of the BEE members and the experience gained in practice on how the energy system and the market design in Germany must be changed in order to supply 100 per cent of the consumers with renewable energies. D

Author Dipl.-Ing. agr. (FH) Martin Bensmann Editor of the Biogas Journal Fachverband Biogas e.V. Phone: 00 49 54 09 90 69 426 e-mail: martin.bensmann@biogas.org BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

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Outside, a student is welding a kind of drum, which is to become a miniaturesized biogas fermenter.

Technical Assistant NawaRo Two vocational training colleges at Lüchow and Gifhorn, two municipalities in Lower Saxony, have been offering their students a training course to qualify as a “Technical Assistant for Processing Regrowing Raw Materials” since 2008.

By Angelika Sontheimer

T

he project has been launched by the joint municipality of Lüchow (in the Wendland district), in order to strengthen the training structures in this infrastructurally weak region in the easternmost rural district of Lower Saxony, in order to satisfy the demand for specialists in the growing biogas sector and to establish a new job profile: the state-examined Technical Assistant for Processing Regrowing Raw Materials, in brief: TA NawaRo. “The vocational training closely follows the dual training courses for machine and plant operators and covers subjects usually taught in Production Engineering, Electrical Engineering and Process Engineering for the generation of renewable energies from regrowing raw materials,” the three-member EnerGO project team consisting of Birgit Körschner, Stefan Gadegast and Iris Baas explains. EnerGo, a project of the joint municipality of Lüchow (Wendland), optimizes the interaction of full-time schooling

20

and training under the dual system. This is also confirmed by Dr. Hergen Scheck, the coordinator for Metal Engineering at the vocational training college of Lüchow: “With this training course for the biogas sector we aim to turn out qualified plant operators who can operate biogas plants more or less independently after having been duly familiarized with the plant.”

Internships at three stations What do young people think about their training? Thomas Pütting, 34 years old, is one of them. After having passed the technical-oriented high school examinations (Alevel examinations), he started a traineeship as a radio and television mechanic. Later, he began studying Electrical Engineering, but did not like the rather theoretical approach of the study course and concluded for himself: “I’d rather like to concentrate on subjects like ecology and regenerative energies.”

Having moved to the municipality of Hitz-

acker, he read an advert from EnerGO in the daily paper and contacted the team at a regional trade exhibition. He is now an intern in his first year of training and in the process of completing the “Three station model”. We meet him on the premises of Corntec Biogas GmbH in Schnega, a pure NawaRo plant with an electrical output of 1.5 megawatts (MW), with facilities for drying fermentation residues and a satellite combined heat and power unit in the village nearby. Process manager Jürgen Schulz has already introduced several students and interns into the plant operations and the equipment of the biogas plant. You can feel that he likes working with young people and passing on his knowledge in this way. Thomas Pütting will stay in the plant for one week. Then, for another week, he will accompany a service technician all over the country to gain impressions, and eventually he will spend one week in Corntec’s headquarters in the city of Twist/Emsland. A good job altogether. F BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

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1 From left: trainee Thomas Pütting talks with Project Manager Stefan Gadegast and Process Manager Jürgen Schulz at Corntec Biogas GmbH.

2 Torben Connor Liebermann (in front) and his classmates are proud of their emergency CHP. 3 Tobias Cordts with his trainee advisor Ralf Beulke. "We must also have the qualifications of the trainers in view," the experienced Operations Manager notes.

4 Thore Schepmann has already completed a teaching to be a farmer. He hopes the further training will give him additional professional opportunities.

Emergency Power Unit and Mini-Reactorr Torben Connor Liebermann is already in his second year of training. We meet him and his fellow-students in the workshop of Lüchow’s vocational training college.

Highly concentratedly, the eight young men assemble their work piece, an emergency power unit for the biogas plant. They carefully fix the waste gas hose to the exhaust before they start the engine. It works!

Smoothly and evenly, as required. The trainees have jointly accomplished their assignment.

Outside, another student is welding a kind of drum, which is to become a miniaturesized biogas fermenter. “The boys all work independently and in a project-oriented way; it would suffice if I restricted my presence merely to answering their questions,” Sascha Künzel, their technology teacher, explains. Comprehensive physical calculations are displayed on the green board in the workshop. And after all, the interest and the

22

commitment among the young students seem to be fairly high.

Torben Liebermann says about himself: “I have never ever aimed for an office job, since I am more technically skilled.” In the process of his vocational training, the 20-year old student-trainee had to give his career a new direction after the initial year at the vocational college and a short-lived traineeship as a joiner, when the company offering the training went bankrupt. However, he had no difficulties in changing from wood to metal, quite the contrary: his prospects for the future are secured already. After the end of the school year in summer, Torben Liebermann will start a job in a new biogas plant which processes natural gas, feeds power into the grid and runs a biogas station.

Additional Qualification for Agriculture “We are a good team and have a lot of fun during our training here,” Thore Scheppmann reports. The 23-year old student

comes from a farm with 40 dairy cows in Lanze, where maize, potatoes and grain are cultivated. Having already completed his vocational training as a farmer, he toys with the idea of building an agricultural biogas plant as another portfolio and wants to prepare himself for this project.

In his opinion, the option of supplying the 80 inhabitants of his little village with locally generated heat is promising. While being trained as a TA NawaRo he will obtain the entrance qualification for attending a technical college of higher education. The training includes a half-year internship, which the young farmer and potential operator of a biogas plant intends to do in Canada.

Working on One's Own Profile and DIscovering One's Own Strengths Next we talk to Tobias Cordts who we meet on the premises of the Lüchow-based agri.capital Biogas Zwei GmbH, where he works as an intern. The NawaRo plant here BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

generates biomethane in quantities equivalent to 2.7 MWel and feeds it, after it has been conditioned accordingly, into the grid of power supplier E.on. Apart from the management and three commercial clerks, the plant employs three blue-collar workers: an electrician, a machine and plant constructor and a waste water specialist.

The biogas plant therefore offers ideal ambient conditions for an intern. Tobias Cordts is, like Thomas Pütting, an intern in his first year of training. His further professional career is not quite clear as yet, but he would like to study, since he started the training course as a TA NawaRo after eleven years of schooling. Before that, he attended a technical high school and will obtain the entrance qualification for a technical college of higher education after having completed his vocational training.

“This training will clearly help me to find out where my strong points are,” the 18-year old student explains. His internship advisor, Works Manager Ralf Beulke, is one the initiators of the school test. While confirming the importance of practical training, he also quite clearly says: “The companies must also be in a position to provide training and advice to trainees.” Often enough, the biogas plant operator is not sufficiently qualified himself to provide training in a number of

Extracts from the general curriculum The Technical Assistant for Processing Regrowing Raw Materials is a technical job linking various disciplines in the fields of agriculture, process engineering and electrical engineering. A person thus qualified can operate process engineering systems and is in a position to analyze process parameters, to perform measurements as well as maintenance jobs and to carry out simple repairs involving metallic and electric equipment. They can also be assigned the acquisition and proper storage of the substrates and may be required to support the marketing of biomethane or fermentation residues.

Contact: EnerGO Theodor-Körner-Str. 14 D-29439 Lüchow (Wendland) Phone: 00 49 58 41 126-140 www.energo-luechow.de e-mail: energo@luechow-wendland.de

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

fields, such as the acquisition of substrate and the marketing of fermentation residues, since a biogas plant-specific training has not existed so far. On the other hand, it requires time and a strong will to introduce young people to this technology and instruct them accordingly, the experienced plant operator says.

Personal Maturity Will Grow with Increasing Age Dreyer & Bosse Kraftwerke GmbH at Gorleben is the last station of this research into the new job profile of TA NawaRo, where we meet project-manager Hans-Joachim Hinze, who is in charge of training plant mechanics for piping systems, as well as Thomas Kalkhake, production manager for electrical engineering and in charge of training electronic technicians for operating equipment.

The two have accepted TA NawaRo graduates for further training in dual courses. They consider it a clear advantage that the young people have not only acquired a basic technical qualification at school but that they are also much more mature due to their higher age and the social competences acquired in those years. It is therefore possible to reduce the training period, although not necessarily obligatory.

Conclusion: A new sector needs new job profiles. The biogas sector needs farmers who can produce top-quality substrate, plant operators who can control and maintain the equipment, merchants who can purchase the substrate and sell the products and residues, marketing and public relation specialists who can promote the image of renewable energy generated from biomass – both at a local and supra-regional level – as well as metal workers, IT experts and electronic specialists who can build the plants and their components. The new vocational training course TA NawaRo will satisfy some of these demands and fits ideally into the biogas landscape. D

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ENGLISH SPECIAL 1

Hot Air Fills the Coffers BN Nordhümmlinger Biogas GmbH &Co KG in Börger/Emsland has generated power and heat for seven years now, with a third product having been marketed since 2010: top-quality fertilizer, generated as a result of drying the fermentation product. The nutrient-rich granulate will be further processed by MeMon, a Dutch producer of fertilizer. The production of the fertilizer makes it possible to utilize the heat in an optimal way and will reduce the excess nutrients in this region which is characterized by livestock breeding.

By Steffen Bach

H

ot dry air hits Wilfried Sievers in the face, when he opens the door to the heat aisle of the drying plant. “Here the air flows through the heat exchanger into the driers,” the farmer and energy expert from Börger in the Emsland region explains.

90 degree centigrade hot water from the cooling system of the combined heat and power plant (CHP) heats up the inflowing air to such an extent that you cannot stand in front of the heat exchanger without the risk of burning your skin. On the long side opposite the belt drier, a plant housed in shining sheet metal, approx. 15 m long, 2 m wide and 3m high, runs through the narrow room.

The drier processes some of the fermentation products from the biogas plant into a nutrient-rich granulate. The man from the Emsland region, who fattens bulls on his farm and grows fodder as well as industrial potatoes, started the biogas production seven years ago. Together with two other farmers from his village he founded BN Nordhümmlinger Biogas GmbH & Co. KG. In a first step, the plant was originally designed for a CHP with a capacity of 500 kilowatts (kW). Since Sievers wanted to

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keep his options for an extension open, he decided to register a commercial plant, as a consequence of which the municipality drew up a development plan for this site 2 km outside the village center. The fermenters are fed with regrowing raw materials (maize and green rye) exclusively, while solid and liquid manure are not used at all.

The substrate will be pumped into the storage tank for the fermentation products after a retention time of 120 days in the fermenter.

Heat for the School and Open-Air Swimming Pool In the meantime, the four fermenters with their total volume of 8,800 m³ supply biogas to three CHPs with a total capacity of 1,700 kW. An 835-kW-CHP is located immediately next to the biogas plant. Another one with a capacity of 500 kW has been built on the premises of Alfons Gerdes, a co-shareholder. The farmer and sub-contractor uses some of the heat himself and supplies the rest to a Caritas workshop.

The third CHP with its capacity of 370 kW is located in the village center and supplies the school, the nursery and the open-air bath with district heat. Another district heat cus-

tomer was acquired, when four poultry fattening plants for 160,000 animals all in all were built in the immediate vicinity of the biogas plant.

“Although we have been able to sell a lot of heat, some of it was still blown into the air via the heat exchangers, especially in summer,” Wilfried Sievers says angrily. This has been one of the reasons to look at the option of drying the fermentation products. The shareholders got to know the business concept of the Dutch company MeMon at a trade exhibition.

This company purchases dried fermentation products from biogas producers, in order to further process them into fertilizer. This drying technique has also been developed in the Netherlands. What makes this system so special is that the fermentation products are not separated, Wilfried Sievers explains.

MeMon prefers this particular technique because the dried fermentation product can not only be processed better, it also binds more nutrients in the granulate.

Drying without Separation With its dry substance content of 6-7 per cent the fermentation product will be BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL 2

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pumped from the storage tank to the drying plant, where the liquid fermentation product is mixed with previously dried fermentation residues in a mixing tank. The wet granulate is now fed onto the belt drier that consists of numerous connected perforated metal sheets, 2 m long and about 10 cm wide.

The hot air flowing through the openings in the metal sheets from underneath evaporates the water. The dry granulate is stored intermediately in a small silo, so as to always have enough material for the ongoing drying process. If the predefined level in the silo is reached, a worm gear conveys some of the granulate to the adjacent storage depot. The drier processes a quarter of the fermentation products, i.e. a quantity of some 4,500 mÂł, into 400 t of high-quality fertilizer.

Air Washer Produces Ammonia Sulfate Solution The exhaust air from the driers runs through a three-stage air washer. The first stage binds the dust, the second ammonia and the third stage separates aerosol. Ammonia reacts with sulfuric acid and forms ammonia sulfate that can be used as a liquid fertilizer or fertilizer additive for liquid manure. Some BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

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4

300 mÂł of liquid fertilizer are annually produced in this way.

How fast the belt drier moves depends on the heat energy provided and thus on the speed of the drying process. If the waste heat of the CHP is required for heating the poultry barn, less heat is left for the drying plant.

The belt drier will then run more slowly or stop until enough hot air for the drying process is available. The drier, designed for a heat capacity of 500 kW, is controlled via two temperature sensors. The drying speed will be derived from the temperature difference between inflowing and outflowing air.

1 The hall with the drier and the fertil-

Optimal Utilization of Heat

4 The optimal use of the heat energy

Thanks to the automatic control, little labour and control input are required.

Another advantage of this technique is that the heat from the CHP can be utilized in an optimal way, Wilfried Sievers emphasizes.

The poultry fattening plant does not require continuous supplies of heat energy. The highest demand arises when the building must be heated up at the beginning of a new fattening cycle.

The energy demand then decreases in the course of the ongoing fattening cycle. These F

izer depot has been erected next to the storage depot for the fermentation products.

2 Four poultry barns are heated with

the waste heat from the 835-kW CHP at the biogas plant. If no heat is required there, Winfried Sievers uses the energy for drying the fermentation product.

3 A charging screw transports the

dry fertilizer from the dryer into the storage. All four to six weeks the fertilizer picked up by truck.

and the production of a fertilizer worth being shipped away are, in Wilfried Sievers’ opinion, the two decisive benefits of the drying strategy.

5 The drying has turned the liquid fermentation product into a nutrientrich fertilizer that is worth being shipped away.

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PHOTOGRAPHS: STEFFEN BACH

ENGLISH SPECIAL

fluctuating heat quantities do not pose a problem to the drying plant, so that the CHP's waste heat can be used in an optimal way throughout the year.

6

Phosphorus and Potassium Are Bound

7

6 Before being dried, the liquid

substrate is mixed with the previously dried fermentation product in the crosswise installed mixing tank. Following that, a worm gear feeds the pasty substance onto the belt dryer.

7 Hot water of up to 90 degrees

Centigrade heats up the incoming air in the heat exchanger.

8 A screw roller distributes the fermentation product evenly over the belt dryer.

From the plant operator’s view, this technique holds further advantages. Since the separation of the fermentation products is not required, phosphorus, potassium and organic nitrogen are fully bound in the granulate. This is an important aspect for biogas plants, above all in areas with excess nutrients. One ton contains on average 31 kg of organic nitrogen, 120 g of ammonia nitrogen, 20 kg of phosphate (P2O5) and 56 kg of potassium (K2O).

The Dutch customer pays €45 for a ton of fertilizer which is collected every six weeks.

The payment is subject to certain criteria.

Higher prices can be fetched, if only vegetable raw materials have been used in the biogas plant and the fermentation product has not been mechanically separated before the drying.

“If we marketed the fertilizer ourselves, we might be able to fetch even higher prices,” the plant operator ponders. The question is, however, whether the extra revenue would cover the marketing expenses. Since the sale of the fertilizer is guaranteed, it is possible to concentrate on the core business, i.e. the biogas production.

Lower Costs for Spreading out the Fermentation Product

8

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The €300,000 investment into the drying plant has definitely paid off, the operators sum up. The technique is interesting under economic aspects in regions with excess nutrients. The revenue from selling the fertilizer and the KWK bonus must cover the investment, financing, maintenance, labour, power and water costs as well as the cost of the sulfuric acid.

Besides, he saves the costs of spreading out the fermentation product and can make use of the liquid ammonia sulfate solution fertilizer. The plant is economically viable in regions with excess nutrients from an annual heat consumption of 2,000 MWh upwards, as Wilfried Sievers has found out. The drier has been designed for a 500-kW biogas plant, but the whole strategy is already economically viable with a capacity of 370 kW and more.

Drying fermentation residues can be one way for the Emsland region with its high livestock density of 2.5 livestock units/ha to BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

NO METHANE SLIP

The hot air is blown through the heat exchanger (left) into the dryer. A three-stage filter cleans the exhaust air and removes dust, ammonia and aerosol.

cope with the excess nutrients. At the moment, biogas plants with a total capacity of about 100 MW are connected with the grid in the rural district. Sievers estimates that so far, at least half the heat energy has not been utilized at all. This means, theoretically, that some 400,000 t of water from fermentation products could be evaporated, which would leave 40,000 t of high-quality fertilizer that is even worth being shipped away.

While Winfried Sievers is explaining the advantages of drying fermentation products, the belt drier is running on, quietly clattering. In the meantime, the granulate in the tank has reached such a level that some of it will have to be channeled to the adjacent storage depot, where the small black particles drop from the opening of the pipe onto the almost 4 m high cone of granulate. Winfried Sievers reaches out into the granulate once again and lets the particles run through his fingers. D

Author Steffen Bach Klußkamp 1 · D-49163 Hunteburg Phone: 00 49 475 1313 e-mail: steffen.bach@gmx.org BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

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ENGLISH SPECIAL The pond, not completely filled yet, in front of the panorama of the Donau-Ries district.

Turning Liquid Manure into Water The reasons are convincing: On the one hand, there was the heat from the biogas plant, which was to be used efficiently, while huge quantities of fermentation products were generated on the other. Peter Rehm has combined both of them and ended up with a complete heat strategy, highly concentrated fertilizer pellets and clear water.

By Dipl.-Ing. agr. Andrea Horbelt

A

ir bubbles rise briskly from the bottom to the surface of the little pond, where they burst. Now and again you can spot the fin of a fish making its way through the clear water. The bank is covered with pebbles of different sizes. A little idyll.

The eye glances beyond the little pond down to the rural Donau-Ries district. On the other side rises the biogas plant, which made the pond possible in the first place. And in front of it: The inventor and operator of this strange combination of fish farm and biogas plant.

“Only recently, the water in this pond has still been part of the fermentation substrate from my plant,” Peter Rehm from Marxheim explains, a place east of Donauwörth. The brown liquid “broth” and the clear water – how do they fit together? The farmer from the rural Donau-Ries district has been operating a biogas plant since 2004. Shortly after putting it into operation, he noticed two things which did not please him at all: The incomplete utilization of the waste heat from the combined heat and power plant (CHP) and vast quantities of fermentation

28

products generated by the plant which had to be shipped back to the fields.

Reducing the Shipping Costs These residues require 700 shipments a year, with 11,000 t of water being part of the freight, because 75 per cent of the fermentation product is nothing but water. Not only are the fuel costs a big financial item, the fuel itself has a negative impact on the climate and on the roads.

In addition to that, the ammonia nitrogen contained in the liquid fermentation product evaporates, so that a second work step is required to spread industrial fertilizer. Besides, storage facilities for fermentation products are not only expensive, they also require a lot of space. In the case of Peter Rehm, a second storage silo was due to be built.

Brilliant Idea All these reasons and circumstances made Peter Rehm think, which eventually gave him an idea that actually sounds quite simple: The fermentation products generated in the biogas plant will, first of all, be separated

into a solid and a liquid phase. The liquid part will subsequently be cleaned and further processed, so that you eventually get clear water on one side and highly concentrated nutrients on the other. The volatile ammonia nitrogen will be converted into a non-volatile form and would thus be available as nitrogen for fertilizing soil and crops.

So far his deliberations. However, it was not that easy to find a firm that would “turn shit into water”. Some water treatment firms were basically interested in implementing the idea – but nobody could imagine that clear water should be turned out as the final product. With one exception: MKR Metzger GmbH from the neighboring city of Monheim, a mere ten kilometres away from Marxheim. The company has been doing business in the field of cleaning and processing the most diverse substances for more than 20 years, although biogas plants have not been among the company’s customers.

Five More Plants “in the Pipeline” Erecting the evaporator plant has been like entering uncharted territory both for Peter F BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

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ENGLISH SPECIAL

PHOTOGRAPHS: ANDREA HORBELT

Peter Rehm documents the purity of his end product.

Rehm and for MKR Metzger GmbH. And it did not prove to be easy all the time. But in the end it is the result which counts, the result that both cooperation partners had expected – and that has been patented in the meantime. Five more plants have been completed since, or are in the process of being completed – and all in the vicinity of Marxheim.

The first step of each, and in each, evaporator plant is the separation of the solid from the liquid phase. The solid part will, for the time being, be stored in the silo, but will be further used at the end of the process chain; the liquid will be heated up in a receiver tank to 70 degrees Centigrade over one hour, in order to ensure optimal hygienization. Following that, the sludge, still brown and liquid, will be fed into a reaction tank, where sulfuric acid is added after certain reactions have taken place, in order to bind the volatile ammonia nitrogen. The latter will liquefy and thus cannot escape any more.

“This is the most important part of the whole story!” Peter Rehm emphasizes.

In a next step, the fermentation product is channeled into a vacuum system, which lowers the water’s boiling point to 50 degrees centigrade. Now the so called “thinfilm evaporation” takes place: The condensed water separates from the remaining very small solids, is cooled subsequently and collected again. “Although evaporating water in a vacuum is not an absolutely new idea – it is still something special on such a large scale and together with the fermentation substrate as well as the other liquids,” the inventor of the plant says. What remains is a semi-fluid brown mass – “like liquid chocolate”.

Water for the Fish Pond

The water collected in the vacuum evaporator (in the background) is channeled through a hose into a tank.

30

The water will be re-treated in a so called “vapour washer” to satisfy the assessment criteria, especially for the chemical (CSB) and biological (BSB) oxygen demand, and can be discharged. The process ends here, when the desired clear, odorless and distilled water can be fed into the fish pond and/or in a water-containing drainage ditch. The bubbles in the fish pond add oxygen to the water, so that the fish can breathe below the surface.

The “chocolate” contains highly concentrated nutrients, such as nitrogen, phosphorus and potash. This sludge will be mixed with the solid phase which had originally been separated, dried and finally pressed into highly concentrated bio-fertilizer pellets. “The unique thing of this invention is BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

The three vacuum evaporators are operated parallel to each other, in order to increase the throughput.

the crystal-clear water that remains at the end,” Peter Rehm emphasizes and looks at his pond very pleasedly.

The plant is expected to run under full load from mid-July, so that 11,000 t of dischargeable water and some 1,200 t of pellets can be produced per annum. One ton of fermentation substrate will produce an average of 120 kg of pellets. The way Peter Rehm can use them is determined by the market. Most likely, he will completely sell them. The demand is high already. “The market for fertilizer pellets gains more and more momentum,” the farmer comments happily. Nobody likes shipping water to the fields – much less in view of the current diesel prices.

Saving Industrial Fertilizer Peter Rehm will include his two existing storage facilities for the fermentation products into the retention time. “This will make it possible to minimize the residue gas potential even further,” Rehm underlines. “I will arrive at a level far below the 1.5 per cent stipulated in the TA Luft (the German Clean Air Code)! These are all side effects that need to be taken into consideration as well.” It is not only the financial and climate protection advantages which the evaporator plant provides; the avoidance of traffic also improves the relationship with the neighbours. In addition to that, the groundwater is better protected against pollution. Rehm saves industrial fertilizer and can grow his own fish on top of that.

It goes without saying that Peter Rehm will not lean back now and live on the fruits of his work: “There is much more buzzing in my head.” In the future, he intends to use BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

the entire heat, including the waste heat of the CHP, for drying purposes, to name just one example. In order to implement this project, he keeps in permanent contact with the environmental authority. The reason: If the emissions of the exhaust heat were bound by the end product, i.e. the pellets, a catalytic converter would no longer be required and one would still be entitled to claim the clean air bonus. The fermentation product would act as the catalytic converter like a “washing bio-filter”.

But, first of all, he must make sure to recoup the money he invested in his pioneering project, in which a lot people have shown interest in the meantime: He has already welcomed guests from Macedonia, Denmark and Spain, but above all from Germany. Many representatives from municipalities have come to see his invention, but also from dairies which want to turn their washing water into clear water again.

“I am quite sure that the employment of this plant is by no means restricted to the biogas sector only,” Rehm says. And while looking around from the fish pond to his biogas plant and beyond all this over the rural DonauRies district, he cannot but confirm to himself that “we have accomplished quite an interesting thing, indeed.” D

Author Dipl.-Ing. agr. Andrea Horbelt Press Relation Officer German Biogas Association Angerbrunnenstr. 12 · D-85356 Freising Phone: 00 49 81 61 98 46 60 e-mail: info@biogas.org

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“An Important Step towards a More Sustainable Energy Supply” RWE, an important energy supplier in Germany, is now testing elements for the power grid of the future in a pilot project in the Eifel region. As part of the “Smart Country” project, an existing biogas plant has been equipped with a daily storage tank. This means the plant can now generate most of its energy at night and thus relieve the distribution network.

By Martin Frey

T

the first pioneers and trendsetters in this area. The farmer has not just attached a sign with the inscription “Hoffmann’s energy farm” to his main building, but is fully dedicated and committed to his new way of farming. His farm was established in 1950; he is the second generation of farmers and has been managing the farm in a father-son private partnership since 2008, i.e. three people and one part-time employee look after 184 hectares of arable land. In addition, he has 60 milk cows, supplying the liquid manure for his biogas plant.

Wind, Biogas and Use of Solar Energy Heinz Hoffmann became an energy farmer when he, together with five other farmers, built nine Ernercon wind energy plants with a total capacity of 5.1 MW. One year later he built the biogas plant to use the liquid manure from his cows in a sustainable manner. The plant consisted of a 600-m³ fermenter, a 110-kWel combined heat and power plant, a 70-m³ pre-fermentation tank and a 1,250-m³ storage tank. Looking back he says: “At that time this was one of the PHOTOGRAPH: MARTIN FREY.

his daily storage tank added to a biogas plant is the first pilot project of its kind in Germany. Heinz Hoffmann, a 54-year-old farmer in the region, welcomes the project: “We are proud of being able to implement this project together with RWE, because this is an important step towards a more sustainable approach to energy supply.” On his farm, called “Hoffmann’s energy farm”, located in Üttfeld-Spielmannsholz in the district of Bitburg-Prüm, he has been working to increase the use of renewable energies for many years now and was one of

“Hoffmann’s energy farm”: On the left a stable, then the CHP, the two small domes of the fermenters and the large dome of the daily storage tank on the fermented substrate storage.

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BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

PHOTOGRAPH: MARTIN FREY.

first biogas plants in Germany. Nobody around here had any experience, we were real pioneers.” When the German Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG) was amended in 2004, he decided to add a new fermenter (1,200 m³) and a 190-kW CHP in 2005. Finally, a new mobile bunker silo and a 3,200-m³ storage tank were built in 2008.

Two years ago Hoffmann discovered his enthusiasm for photovoltaics and installed solar panels on several of his roofs (total capacity 60 kWp). That was why RWE selected him for participation in the Smart Country Project in 2011. The problem was that the feed-in peaks from solar energy aggravated the difficult situation in the distribution networks. The idea was to stop feed-in from the biogas plant during peak times which meant a time delay between biogas production (round the clock) and electricity generation.

Network Integration of Renewable Energies Hoffmann‘s farm is now part of a large-scale RWE project which has been going on since the middle of last year. Torsten Hammerschmidt, manager of the 6.2 million Euro project of RWE Deutschland AG in Essen “Networks for the Power Supply of the Future/Smart Country” says: “The target is to be able to connect more producers of renewable energies to our existing distribution networks.”

The project has a term of three years and 50 per cent of its funding comes from the Federal Ministry of Economics. In addition to the biogas plant, it includes numerous measuring points in the regional power grid, several voltage regulators and the construction of an eight-kilometre “power highway” between the village of Arzfeld and the biogas plant. The project also covers some parts of the Emsland – a region with a similar rural structure and many producers of renewable energies. Partners in the project are ABB, Consentec (an engineering consultant) and the Dortmund Technical University.

The Eifel – a MOdel Region According to RWE, the Eifel region is well suited to test such concepts. The district of Bitburg-Prüm, with 50 inhabitants/m², is the most thinly populated area of RhinelandPalatinate. The generation input from renewable energies into the grid is three times higher than the maximum annual load. RWE, the operator of the distribution network, expects this ratio to increase eightfold by 2030. This means that the Eifel BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

Torsten Hammerschmidt, manager of the pilot project “Networks for the Power Supply of the Future/Smart Country” of RWE Deutschland AG, works in the asset management department of the grid operator: “With this project we want to show how we can connect more producers of renewable energies to our distribution networks.”

region demonstrates now what Germany has to expect in the future.

Together with RWE, Hoffmann converted his existing biogas plant: The most important change is that his old fermentation product storage has been extended by a 2,000-m³ storage and equipped with a double membrane roof. In addition to that, a 110-kWel CHP was closed down, and a new 220-kWel CHP was added to the remaining 190-kWel station, which brought the total capacity to 410 kWel.

Plant data Commissioning: (2001, 2005)/2011 Fermenter (2): 1,800 m³ Gas production: 160 m³/h Gas storage: 3.2 MWel, approx. 2,000 m³, Low pressure: 3 mbar Cycle: max. 8-10 hours storage operation CHP: 410 kWel Annual generation: 3.2 million kWhel 3.5 million kWhth Further information: RWE Deutschland AG, www.rwe.com

Furthermore, a central pump container including gas treatment was installed. At the same time, all the old plant parts were refurbished: “The fermenters were equipped with new roofs, all piping and the control system was replaced,” Hoffmann says. Altogether, the conversion took nearly 20 weeks and was completed in June 2011. Due to the tight project schedule, conversion and upgrading were a real challenge for all involved. Hoffmann remembers that the control system for the start and stop operation of the CHP was an especially tough job.

Photovoltaics-based Control System The result is something to be proud of: The plant is now able to store a complete daily cycle of biogas. In general, the complete gas production is pumped into the storage tank during the day. Gas storage starts as soon as power is fed into the grid from the photovoltaic panels. Hammerschmidt explains: “It is also possible to use another external signal for charging and discharging the unit, for instance on the basis of the current grid load which is also influenced by wind power. The F

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ENGLISH SPECIAL

The biogas plant of “Hoffmann’s energy farm” consists of the control station, the CHP, two fermenters, two substrate storages and the biogas storage tank able to store a daily production, as well as a pump station.

Substrate storage 1

Substrate storage 2

Biogas storage

Digestor 1

Digestor 2 CHP

Control station The CHP has a capacity of 410 kWel.

CHART: RWE DEUTSCHLAND AG.

The biogas plant generates electricity at those times when the photovoltaic systems do not feed any electricity into the grid. In this way, the distribution network is relieved around midday.

Performance CHP (kW)

CHP performance PV performance

PV feed-in (%) CHART: RWE DEUTSCHLAND AG.

signal lines required have already been installed, and this mode of operation will also be tested within our pilot project.”

Now, as soon as the feed-in of power from the solar panels stops in the evening, the CHP starts to generate electricity. This means that the gas storage tank empties. Its storage capacity is sufficient to stop feed-in from biogas for eight to ten hours. Power production during the night continues until the storage tank has become completely empty and can take up the gas for the next cycle.

From the economic point of view, such a daily storage system is now an optimum

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approach to a biogas plant. Torsten Hammerschmidt comments: “We work with a low-pressure storage which means that we need less than two per cent of the stored energy for charging and discharging the storage tank. Storing the biogas for a longer period of time would require other techniques with higher pressure and compaction and expansion resulting in additional energy losses.”

Substrates from the Region Hoffmann is fully aware that environmental issues are becoming increasingly important for the acceptance of biogas projects: 60 per

cent of the substrates in his plant come from maize, 30 per cent from liquid cattle manure, seven per cent from grass and grains. He grows maize on 101.5 hectares, buys silage maize from an area of 30 hectares and grows Triticale on an area of 28 hectares. 35 hectares are agricultural grassland and 17 hectares intensively managed permanent grassland. The liquid manure comes from his 60 milk cows. A neighboring farm is involved in the fermenting of additional manure.

According to Hoffmann, the high share of maize is unavoidable: “Due to its rough climate, the Eifel region is hardly suitable to grow millet or other alternatives.” In the past Hoffmann experimented with mixed crops, but gave it up later on: “The different maturity levels are not good for gas production.”

Since maize is on the fields for six months only, Hoffmann thinks it is more important for the environment to use alternating sequences of green manure, yellow mustard and fallow land for the remaining period.

Plantyield is Optimized The biogas plant has become much more efficient after conversion, now generating 3.2 kilowatt hours of electricity per year. Only six per cent of this is needed for plant operation, which means only half of the power commonly required for other plants. However, Hoffmann still sees additional potential with regard to waste heat utilization: The CHP produces roughly 3.5 million kilowatt hours of heat per year. 35 per cent of this BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

PHOTOGRAPH: MARTIN FREY.

ENGLISH SPECIAL

Farmer Heinz Hoffmann (54) is delighted: “We are proud of being able to implement this project together with RWE, because it is an important step towards a more sustainable energy supply.�

heat is used to heat the two residential buildings on the farm as well as the fermenters.

The remaining heat remains unused.

Hoffmann comments: “Unfortunately we have not yet found a commercially sustainable solution for additional heat use.� However, there is hope for the future: A small ORC plant will be built to generate electricity from the remaining heat at a temperature of 85 degrees Centigrade. Placing the gas storage on top of the secondary fermentation tank ensures that the substrate is completely fermented. While the substrates stay in the fermenter for 70 days, the overall retention time in the plant is more than 160 days. And this is good for the environment: “The substances that we spread on the fields do not contain any methane that might pollute the atmosphere.�

Conclusion: The new storage tank belongs to RWE Deutschland. Currently it is still too early to speculate on the type of usage after the three-year project phase. Both Hoffmann, the farmer, and Hammerschmidt, the RWE representative, agree however that use of the storage will continue. And Hoffmann has some additional projects for the near future: for instance one additional CHP with a capacity of 250 kWel. In addition he plans a further 4,000 mÂł liquid manure storage.

Hammerschmidt is glad that the project in the Eifel region is running so well and can be considered a valuable experience. Visitor groups are coming nearly every week to gather information on the project. Taking into account that there are more than 7,200 biogas plants in Germany, he sees great potential for equipping these plants with

such storage tanks. For the grid operator it is important to use the system to relieve the grid and not to produce eco-power for speculating in the power exchange. In such a case it would not be possible to reduce the level of grid expansion. For Hoffmann the important thing right now is: “It is good that we can use our biogas plant to ensure flexible power feed-in.� D

Author Martin Frey Specialized journalist for renewable energies Gymnasiumstr. 4 ¡ D-55116 Mainz www.agenturfrey.de

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BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

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ENGLISH SPECIAL

Colour into the Field

Stripes in Bloom from Flensburg to Oberstdorf The project ”Farbe ins Feld“ (FIF – “colour into the field“) is growing in the true sense of the word and running for the third time in 2012 already. The project’s aim was, and still is, to create well visible and ecologically valuable flowering strips alongside, and inside, fields with bioenergy crops all over Germany.

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he flowered area created in 2011 is equivalent to a 3 m wide strip across Germany, from its border to Denmark right down to the Alps. The project was initiated in spring 2010 during the “Biogas Tour” on the occasion of the elections to the State Parliament in North-Rhine Westphalia. Public discussions have focused on the cultivation of bioenergy crops as early as that. This has not changed at all two years later, despite the “energy turnaround” that has been introduced thereafter. Gaining and maintaining a broad acceptance is essential for extending the generation of energy from biogas as an important element in the future energy mix.

Biomass grown for the generation of biogas must therefore be cultivated effectively and environmentally-friendly. Apart from increasingly growing new and alternative bioenergy crops, the creation of flowering strips is another way of making the cultivation of biomass, especially maize, ecologically useful.

The benefits of flowering strips are quite obvious: ■ Flowering strips are an important food source and habitat for insects feeding on blossoms, such as butterflies and bees, as

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well as for numerous other species (such as birds).

■ Among the animals benefitting from the flowering strips are many that are useful for agriculture (such as ladybirds), because they make a contribution to biological pest control.

■ The maintenance of the vegetation structure in winter provides sufficient coverage for wild animals in an agriculturally used landscape even during the cold season and will protect creatures hibernating in the ground against freezing to death.

■ Flowering strips are important habitats to retreat to, from where the adjacent agricultural areas can be recolonized after the harvest.

■ Created as a protective strip against erosion, flowering strips can prevent the soil from being washed away, for example on inclined surfaces.

■ Flowering areas enhance the landscapes visually and put them back into bloom. A landscape‘s recreation value is increased as is the quality of life for man. If the peo-

ple become positively aware of agriculture, it will improve its image.

■ Flowering strips from a certain width onwards may also help solving difficulties in hunting wild boar in fields of maize.

Many federal states have recognized the importance of flowering strips for the agricultural landscape and have supported the creation of such strips with grants. However, the volume of such grants has previously been drastically reduced, so that they are no longer available in all federal states. This may be one reason, why the number of flowering strips in fields with bioenergy crops is not even higher.

Another reason is the red tape that is often required before flowering strips can be created, especially when grants are claimed for the purpose. Farmers therefore often do without the state grants and rather create such flowering strips “voluntarily“. But legal hurdles will have to be negotiated even then.

A uniform user code at national level All farmers will usually apply for the singlefarm payment. In order to do so, the use of the agricultural area must be reported to the agriculture administration, which includes

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

PHOTOGRAPH: FACHVERBAND BIOGAS E.V.

By Dr. Stefan Rauh and Dipl. Wirtschaftsing. (FH) Marion Wiesheu

ENGLISH SPECIAL

the flowered area thus cultivated. This has resulted, after all, in a new user code (NC 897) that was introduced at national level in 2012 and that also includes flowering strips.

Unlike last year, it is now clear which user code must be assigned to acreage used as flowering strip. In order to qualify for a grant, such acreage must not only be precisely recorded, say by an online application, but also cover a minimum area of 0.3 hectares (this value may vary from federal state to federal state and should be inquired before filing the application).

In a move to avoid this immense effort necessary for an application, several federal states have now offered user codes where the acreage used for flowering strips need not be explicitly calculated. In such cases, a distinction is made between user codes 176 and 177. Code 176 represents maize (fields) in good agricultural and ecological conditions with a hunting lane. The flowering strips must not be agriculturally used at the end of the vegetation period.

Reducing Red Tape However, if given over to agricultural use, say in the form of substrate for biogas plants, code No. 177 must be stated. This includes maize with a hunting lane of another culture. In order to further promote the cultivation of flowering strips, it would be desirable if all federal states paved the way for this less cumbersome application procedure, and also for other bioenergy crops. It will only be possible to win over more farmers for the project “Farbe ins Feld”, and to make a contribution to more ecological sustainability, if the red tape can be limited. This is

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

a challenge especially for the agriculture administration.

In order to give operators a further impetus, the Fachverband Biogas e.V. called out the “Competition of the Regions“ as well as the “Competition for the most beautiful flowered area richest in species“ for the first time in 2011. All 23 regional branches of the Fachverband were called upon to sow as many flowering strips as possible. The branches with the largest number of hectares and the operator with the most beautiful flowering strip were awarded attractive prizes.

The prize-awarding ceremony took place in Bremen on January 11, 2012 during the Fachverband’s 21st Annual General Meeting. The first prize of 3,000 euros went to the Lüneburger Heide regional branch.

Almost every 10th of a total of 2,500 biogas producers of the Fachverband Biogas e.V. took part in the Competition of the Regions, so that it was possible to ecologically enhance more than 1,000 fields with bioenergy crops. As mentioned earlier, this has been equivalent to a 3 m wide strip that has been put into bloom across Germany. These competitions are taking place again in 2012, and there is reason to hope that even more flowering strips will be created this year.

Seed Companies Support the Project So far, five seed companies have supported the project “Farbe ins Feld” by offering members of the Fachverband Biogas e.V. a discount on the seeds purchased. Besides, the Deutsche Jagdschutzverband e.V. (DJV – German Hunting Association) has been

won over as a cooperation partner. The project also receives attention from other moral supporters. For information about the project partners and supporters, please refer to the homepage under www.farbe-ins-feld.de.

You will find further information on the project as such and on flowering strips in general on this website. Among other things, an instruction on how to properly cultivate a flowering strip can be downloaded. The Fachverband Biogas e.V. thinks it important that the flowering strips thus created do not merely have a visual effect, but also an ecological benefit.

In addition to that, the Fachverband has also designed information boards about fields with bioenergy crops and about biogas facilities as well as large banners to be attached to fermenters. They are intended to inform the general public about the processes going on in a field with bioenergy crops and how biogas plants work. You can download order forms also from the homepage of the project. The Fachverband Biogas will make great efforts to further expand the project “Farbe-ins-Feld” in the forthcoming years, in order to support the cultivation of flowering areas. D

Authors Dr. Stefan Rauh Head of the Agriculture Department Dipl.-Wirtschaftsing. (FH) Marion Wiesheu Member Service Manager Fachverband Biogas e.V. Angerbrunnenstr. 12 · D-85356 Freising Phone: 00 49 81 61 98 46 60 E-mail: info@biogas.org

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ENGLISH SPECIAL

Sugar Beets on the Outskirts of the Ruhr Area The cultivation of sugar beets does not necessarily require top-class soil, as is aptly demonstrated by Johannes Körner. He grows the sweet field crop on sandy soil. However, he does not only produce sugar from it, but also biogas. He has selected a new plant species for the fermentation.

By Thomas Gaul

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he colleagues were sceptical: Sugar beets on light soil with a soil value between 30 and 35. This is not going to work, so the majority’s opinion. However, Johannes Körner, a passionate farmer from Hamminkeln-Dingden (in the district of Wesel), stuck to his idea. “The sugar beet yields have increased from year to year,” the farmer says, who cultivates 180 hectares (ha) of land on the outskirts of the Ruhr area. Apart from growing vegetables for a well-known producer of deep-freeze food, the cultivation of grain for his own distillery has been the mainstay of his farm for centuries.

But this could not go on forever, since the general political conditions for the agricultural sector have changed: “In two years‘ time we’ll be losing our distillery rights,” Körner confesses. “So we had to think about what to do then. It did not take us very long to decide in favour of biogas.” Even before the biogas plant was built, Körner made arrangements for utilizing the heat.

The Klausenhof, a Protestant Academy, is located not more than one kilometre away from the site earmarked for the biogas plant.

“I approached their administration,” Körner reports, and shortly thereafter a heat supply contract was concluded. The plant, initially designed for a capacity of 190 kilowatts (kW), has been slowly upgraded via an intermediate stage of 250 kW to 300 kW, at which it operates now. After the heat supplies to the Academy had been ensured, further private houses in the village were connected with the plant via a satellite CHP (combined heat and power unit) by the end of 2011.

Fermenter Equipment Similar to a Cow's Rumen

UDR fixed-bed fermenter from Energieanlagen Röring.

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When it came to the plant’s equipment, the operator decided in Favour of the “UDR” fermenter of Energieanlagen Röring from Vreden/Münsterland. The manufacturer of the fixed-bed fermenter has had a good look at the “tried and tested” digestive system of BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

a cow‘s rumen: But unlike the rumen villi that offer the microbes the largest possible colonialisation surface, it is a system of special macro-porous plastic tubes installed vertically in the fermenter.

The surface offered to the micro-organisms as colonialisation area, on which a so-called biofilm is generated, adds up to more than 1,600 square metres. Substrate from the stirrer tank fermenter will be pumped into the mixing chamber of the so-called upflow fixed-bed reactor underneath, where it will be mixed and channeled through the piping system from the bottom upwards. Both substrate and biogas will be channeled to the neighboring downflow fixed-bed reactor via a transitional tube, where, in a first step, the active bacteria are separated from the inactive ones in a segregation chamber.

All this works on the principle of gravity: The active microbes rise to the top – like the biogas which is channeled into the gas storage tank – and can be returned to the fermenter (reflow), while the inactive ones sink to the ground and are pumped into the liquid Biogas producer Johannes KĂśrner. manure tank as fermentation product. The two fermenters – “upflowâ€? and “reflowâ€?– have a volume of 70 mÂł each.

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"! ! ! ! ! !

PHOTOS: THOMAS GAUL

ENGLISH SPECIAL

ENGLISH SPECIAL

Storage tank for the sugar beets (on the left-hand side) as well as the CHP container.

Late Sugar Beet Harvest It is important to Körner that the supply with substrates is not dominated by maize. “We ferment one third each of sugar beets mash, maize and liquid manure.” Sugar beets grow on about one quarter of his acreage. As regards the biogas production, Körner intends to keep the sugar beets in the soil as long as possible. In this way the crops can still benefit from an increase in yield and a higher sugar content that rises in late autumn. After the harvest in 2010 the sugar beets were stored in one of the usual clamps on an unploughed strip of the field, before the coarse dirt sticking on them was removed on a cleaning belt. In view of the light soil, Körner wanted to be on the safe side and decided to have the sugar beets washed in a “Weber-Wanne”, a large washtub-style container marketed by the seedbreeding company Strube. The container is filled with water and kainite, so that, due to the different density conditions, the sugar beets will float on the surface while the rocks drop to the bottom.

In order to keep the water moving during the drying process, a paddle shaft is installed on one side of the container. However, when processing sugar beets during the winter, this method came up against limiting factors, Körner regrets: “It didn’t work at temperatures of minus 15 degrees Centigrade last winter, although we had heated up the water to 100 degrees Centigrade.” The sugar beets BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

will be fed into the mixing tank every hour.

The liquid manure contains grains from neighboring pig-breeding farms. “The sugar beet mash makes it easy to agitate the substrate in the fermenter,” Körner says happily.

This also has a positive impact on the plant’s own power consumption which, at five per cent, is fairly low.

Washing the Sugar Beets May Become Superfluous

therefore had to be coarsely chopped with a Doppstadt shredder first and then mashed in a Börger mill.

Sugar Beet Storage in an Enamel Tank This mill can process 120 t of sugar beets into mash in one hour. When it came to storing the mash, Körner decided against building a simple ground basin. “We decided to build a high-level tank which can be extended.” He then chose a tank made of enameled steel based on the Harvestore system. During the most recent cold winter, sheets of floating ice formed on the tank when it was filled with sugar beet mash, the manager tells us.

He has been very satisfied with the sugar beet fermentation during the first five months after the plant was put into operation. “Although the biology builds up only gradually”, Körner reports. But, as many experts working in practice before him, he has detected the “turbo effect” when the sugar beet substrate is fed into the fermenter: “The gas comes within ten days.” The more or less automated process is another big advantage: The sugar beet mash is pumped from the high-level tank into the mixing tank at regular intervals. This is where the other substrates will then be added and the mixture be homogenized. A total of 300 kg of sugar beets, 400 kg of fresh liquid manure and 500 kg of maize or CCM (corn-cob mix) BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

For the future Körner can imagine not having to wash the sugar beets any more. In 2011, he has grown special “biogas beets” for the first time ever. These types of sugar beet, which were assigned well-sounding names like Lissy, Gerti and Klaxon by the seed companies, distinguish themselves by a smoother surface of the sugar beet, so that less soil keeps sticking while the sugar beets are harvested.

When it comes to the beet species, Bernhard Conzen, chairman of the Rheinische Rübenbauer-Verband (Rhenish Beet Growing Association) voices the opposite opinion.

There should be no different species of sugar beets, i.e. one for the sugar factory and one for the fermenter: “It must still be possible to process the sugar beet in the factory, should the biogas plant be unable, for whatever reason, to accept sugar beets.” The beetgrowing farmers, whose representative he is, consider the biogas beet an alternative to the industrial beet. “The best sugar beet species are also the best biomass species”.

His answer is not so clear when it comes to sugar beets from light soil “Washing or not?”: “Soil is no problem for the biogas plant, as long as it is not sand.” He reminds me not to forget that even from maize 1.5 2 per cent of sediments end up in the fermenter. In his opinion, the soil could even have a useful function in the fermenter: “The soil from the sugar beets serves as a wellness package to the bacteria.” The trace elements contained in the soil make it possible to do completely without enzyme additives.

Conzen considers it feasible to clean the sugar beets to such an extent that only less than one per cent of soil remains after the washing: “We have the right equipment, all we need to do is use it.” D

GAS COOLER

For Biogas Author Thomas Gaul Freelance journalist Im Wehrfeld 19a · D-30989 Gehrden Mobile: 00 49 1 72 5 12 71 71 e-mail: gaul-gehrden@t-online.de

C www.calorplast.de

CALORPLAST

Energy from Wild Plants – the Research Gains Momentum The acreage used for operating biogas plants is increasing year by year, with silage maize dominating as the most attractive energy crop from the economic point of view. Since this will result in monotonous landscapes with a few species only in many places, the Bayerische Landesanstalt für Weinbau und Gartenbau (LWG – Bavarian State Agency for Viticulture and Horticulture) focuses its research on flowering mixtures that are rich in species and can be used for the generation of energy, thus complementing maize and other standard biogas cultures.

By Dr. Birgit Vollrath

Area used for practical tests near Miltenberg in the first year of cultivation with flowering hollyhocks, sun flowers and white clover (photograph taken on 14 July 2011).

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BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

PHOTOGRAPH: ANTJE WERNER

ENGLISH SPECIAL

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Cover for Birds, Hares & Co. Further ecological advantages are that pesticides become superfluous and only little production-related interference is required: After being sown, the soil rests for five years and only requires being fertilized and harvested once a year. The vegetation carpet which remains undisturbed until autumn and the stubble structure that remains over the winter offer cover for birds, hares and other wild animals living in the open country. Wild plant carpets of this kind will create retreats for animals even on small areas, such as on little plots of land or as marginal strips along large plots of maize. This will contribute to an increase in the diversity of species and biotopes in the agricultural landscape.

The input required to manage the wild plant cultures is low: Unlike most perennial cultures, the wild plants need not be planted but are sown, which is much more costeffective. Thanks to the few working steps required later on, the input remains low also in the future. The long resting period of the soil over several years, the reduced employment of machines, the vegetation carpet that remains intact over the entire year and the dense penetration of the soil with roots, offer protection against soil compaction and erosion while the risk of substances being washed into surface waters is also reduced.

Water Protection through the Cultivation of Wild Plants Although systematic analyses have not been carried out as yet, it can be expected that, due to the wild plants’ long vegetation period BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

Accumulated dry mass yields between 2009 and 2011 of the highest yielding mixtures from the test sites at Oldenburg, Würzburg and Miltenberg

dry mass yield

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he project “Energy from wild plants” has laid important foundations and provided a first and effective mixture of such plants for cultivation in practice. In a second project phase from 2012 onwards and within new research projects, the cultivation system is to be further optimized until it is ready for practical application. The advantages of cultivating mixed perennial species of wild plants lie in the enrichment of biodiversity and of the landscape scenery as well as in the long-lasting, environmentally-friendly mode of production which requires little input. The high diversity and attractiveness will be created by combining up to 25 plant species in colorful flowering mixtures. Over several years, they form stable vegetation with varied structures that offers a habitat for numerous species of birds, bats and insects. Bees and other visitors of blossoms find additional food in summer, when the agricultural landscape is meagre.

and the low fertilizer level, the risk of nitrate being washed into the groundwater is lower than in intensive, one-year cultures. Due to its better soil and water protection, the wild plant cultivation offers a number of environmentally-relevant advantages, especially in endangered slopes, in the catchment area of surface waters or in water protection areas.

The first and, so far, most comprehensive research project dealing with wild plant mixtures for the generation of biogas is the project “Energy from wild plants”. Based on a resolution taken by the Bundestag (Federal Parliament), it has been supportedby the Federal Ministry of Agriculture since August 2008 which, on its part, has commissioned the Fachagentur Nachwachsende Rohstoffe (FNR – Agency for Renewable Raw Materials). The project under the control of the LWG has now been extended until February 2015. While Saaten Zeller, a seed company, has been a project partner right from the beginning, further partners joined the project when it started its second phase in March 2012: The Landwirtschaftskammer Niedersachsen (Chamber of Agriculture of Lower Saxony), LfL Bayern, TFZ Straubing and BSA. The project is also supported by an advisory committee, in which the Netzwerk Lebensraum Brache and other associations as well as research institutions are represented. The project can use a large number of test areas and acreage used in practice all over Germany. Faunistic studies on the diversity of species and small animals (such as spiders, ground beetles, bugs, butterflies), birds and bats as well as on the range of food offered to bees will be conducted on selected acreage used for farming in practice.

Optimizing the Seed Mixtures In the first project phase, which ended in 2011, research focused on classifying the

species, as well as on developing the first seed mixtures that will ensure safe crops and high yields. The first and foremost objective was to optimize the composition of the seeds for the cultivation of wild plants in such a way that the highest possible and recurrent methane yields per hectare could be achieved with a single harvest a year and with the lowest possible production input.

New plot tests to examine and classify species and to develop mixtures have now been set up every year since 2009. Since the start of the project, there has been a cooperation with farmers and operators of biogas plants, and their experience with the cultivation of wild plants under realistic conditions in practice is integrated into the tests.

The development of mixtures focuses on perennial species that are necessary to ensure long-lasting stability of the crops.

From the second or third year of their cultivation, these perennial species are the major guarantor of the crops over a long period and thus decisive for the culture’s entire production output. Apart from herbaceous perennials in general, the wild plant mixtures also contain one-year and two-year species that close the yield gap which would be caused by the more slowly growing herbaceous perennials.

Small-Size Tests with Non-Indigenous Herbaceous Perennials Mixtures with herbaceous perennials from non-indigenous landscapes have, so far, only been studied in plot tests. They often showed lower yields due to the insufficient establishment of the two-year and perennial species underneath the densely growing one-year plants, after the growth of all species has been massive during the first year. These findings have been taken into account from F

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Innovation

PHOTOGRAPH: DR. BIRGIT VOLLRATH

ENGLISH SPECIAL

2011

Indigenous herbaceous perennials, such as common tansy, common knapweed and mugwort are the typical feature in the second year of cultivation (Saterland, photograph taken on 16 August 2011).

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2010 onwards, with the mixture composition being changed accordingly, but these mixtures are still a far cry from ready for practical use. On the other hand, test mixtures with various indigenous wild herbaceous perennials (see illustration) have proved to be stable, have grown particularly luxuriantly and could be easily established.

Their yields still fluctuated in the first year of cultivation, because the one-year species did not always thrive ideally during bad weather or when dominated by weeds.

However, it has been possible from the second year of cultivation to regularly achieve yields of between eight and 13 tons of dry mass per hectare (dm/ha). The indigenous wild herbaceous perennials proved to be highly competitive against field weeds and were robust under the prevailing weather conditions. In order to also achieve high yield stability at difficult locations, new forms of cultivating and establishing crops are now being tested.

One variant of the indigenous herbaceous perennials has already been used on fields in practice. This mixture contains only species for which seed crops for the production of seed stocks that are suitable in practice have already been developed. In the meantime, the mixture is already available on the market under the trade name of “Biogas 1”. It will continuously be complemented and improved in accordance with the latest findings and depending on the availability of seeds. The farmers involved will be informed about the further procedure by way of practical guidelines and circular letters, and be questioned about cultivation data and results by means of a questionnaire,

so that their experience can be used in consultations on further cultivation efforts.

200 Hectares Sown in Germany in 2011 In 2011, some 70 farmers from twelve federal states took part in the project and sowed new seeds on a total of 200 ha. Due to the long dry spells at that time, the mixtures often started growing only several weeks after being sown, but by the summer large crops with a loose structure had developed.

Their appearance was largely determined by sunflowers and various alcea species (hollyhocks, see photo on page 42). Due to their extreme height of more than three metres in some cases, the sunflowers were sometimes pushed down when heavy rain soaked the ground, so that the harvest was hampered.

The plant carpet on the fields used for the practical tests reached about 2 metres in height in the second year of cultivation. It was clearly lower than in the first year, but much denser. Common tansy, black knapweed and mugwort, all indigenous herbaceous perennials (see photo above), were dominant as the most important species for the generation of biomass. Up to seven other herbaceous perennials and some two-year species contributed to the rich bio-diversity.

The dry mass yields ranged largely between seven and twelve tons per year and hectare in the first two years of cultivation. A rowindependent chopper was used for the harvest, or the crop was harvested in a singlestep procedure. Preserving the harvested crop in the form of silage did not prove to be a problem and was accomplished with the equipment available.

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

Methane Yield 10-15 Per Cent Lower than That from Silage Maize Although the individual species used in the test partly achieved high methane yields, the gas yield from the mixtures varied heavily at the beginning of the project and sometimes proved to be clearly lower than that from silage maize. However, the gas yield from most mixtures has been considerably increased in the meantime by modifying the mixtures themselves and by observing the optimal harvest date. The methane yield from the mixture used in the practical tests has now been only between ten and 15 per cent lower than from silage maize.

In the second project phase the practical tests and the studies of the accompanying faunistic conditions will be continued and expanded. In order to optimize the seed mixtures, further variants will be developed on the basis of the mixtures from the first test phase. These mixtures will be economically optimized for their use in pure production areas and adapted to various site conditions.

Apart from that, it is intended to develop mixtures that will satisfy the highest demands of nature protection (as required for compensatory and replacement measures etc.). These ecologically optimized variants will use indigenous species of regional origin or seeds from the relevant production area. This kind of optimization and regionalization will be restricted, for the time being, to a few cultivation areas only and serve as a model for other regions.

Various Stands Cultivated on a Trial Basis In a move to optimize crop management, fertilizing tests will be carried out, in the course of which the yield maximum is to be established. The test is also to establish, from which fertilizer quantities onwards nitrogen will be carried into the deeper layers of the soil causing a danger of nitrate being washed into the groundwater. In order to safely establish the plants and to achieve high yield stability, several variants of cultivating the crop will be tested. It is also intended to test alternatives for locations, where the establishment of one-year species is difficult (due to high weed pressure, as an example), and to use, say, maize as catch crop, to sow the mixture in the spring grain or to sow it in autumn in the winter grain.

The approach to cultivate wild plant mixtures for the generation of biogas has been adopted in new projects or integrated into already existing ones for research purposes.

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

The spectrum ranges from individual initiatives and regional projects to larger applied research projects that also include ecological and economic studies. Most projects use the mixture “Biogas 1” which has been developed in the project “Energy from wild plants”, with the mixture being cultivated and managed in a standardized version in accordance with the recommendations. The projects also include, among other things, “Upscaling new energy plants for biogas” (from the University of Osnabrück) which has also been promoted by the Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection (BMELV) as well as “Plenum Bodensee”. As part of a ring test conducted in Bavaria, yields achieved at eight sites from the mixture “Biogas 1” are compared with those of silage maize, with crops being harvested at a certain time to optimize the ideal harvest date (LWG in cooperation with LfL and TFZ, grants from the Bavarian State Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Forestry [BayStMELF]).

Conclusion: The first test sowings and sowings in practice have shown that the cultivation of perennial wild plants for the generation of biogas can achieve considerable yields with a low input. However, these mixtures represent a completely new cultivated form of species, the cultivation of which still requires considerable research efforts. Their development is still in its early stages. It can be expected that the yield potential of the wild plants is far from being fully exploited and that it can be considerably increased by optimizing the mixture composition and the crop management. Many fundamental issues concerning the practical implementation are still unanswered. Apart from intensive PR activities, consultations and the support from the agricultural policy with the aim of a speedy introduction in practice, it still remains necessary to continue practice-oriented research.

This is the only way to turn the cultivation of wild plant mixtures into a success story in the long run, and thus to make a valuable contribution to a future-oriented, long-lasting as well as nature- and environmentally-friendly energy production. D Author Dr. Birgit Vollrath Dept. of Landscape Architecture and Planning Bavarian State Agency for Viticulture and Horticulture An der Steige 15 · D-97209 Veitshöchheim Mobile phone: 00 49 152 09 23 56 64 e-mail: birgit.vollrath@t-online.de

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Composite Plants May Displace Maize Test results of several years have shown that cup plants are a serious competitor for maize.

By Andrea Biertümpfel, Michael Conrad, Wolf-Dieter Blüthner

A field with cup plants in the landscape

I

n the search for useful alternatives or complements to maize as co-ferment in biogas plants, the cup plant, a perennial composite plant from North America, has received a lot of attention in the meantime.

This has quite a number of reasons: ■ The most important one is surely the high biomass yield, which can be compared with maize yield in many locations, or may sometimes be even higher. The cup plant easily adapts to the site where it is cultivated and also grows in regions that are not suitable for maize, such as altitudes of up to 600 m.

■ An advantage of cultivating cup plants is that the ground is covered all year round, so that the risk of erosion is reduced.

■ The long blooming period from July to September as well as its good pollen and nectar value make the cup plant interesting for bee-keepers as well.

■ The cup plant, a flowering plant in high summer/early autumn, has a high cultural value for any landscape.

46

At the end of 2011, cup plants originating from the seed material of N. L. Chrestensen were grown on about 125 hectares by about the same number of farms on fields all over Germany (see Fig. 1). It is already certain that the acreage will be twice as high this year. The size of further areas cultivated with cup plants originating from other seed sources can only be estimated and will not exceed a maximum of 20 - 50 ha.

EEG Capping Promotes Alternative Energy Plants The growing tendency to cultivate cup plants is supported by “capping” the use of maize in biogas plants to 60 per cent of the substrates from 2012 onwards, as stipulated in the amendment to the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG), and by the higher remuneration for selected co-ferments including the cup plant. For years now, the Thüringer Landesanstalt für Landwirtschaft (Thuringian Agency for Agriculture – TLL) has made great efforts to develop and optimize a cultivation method for these plants and to introduce it in the agricultural

practice with the aim of using them in biogas plants.

The TLL coordinates its research in this respect with N. L. Chrestensen GmbH in Erfurt, a company producing and marketing seed stock as well as experimenting with the genetic improvement of cup plants. Important cultivation aims are to achieve an increase in the total biomass, in the gas quantity and in the gas yield as well as to improve the homogeneity of the material.

More Seed Stocks Available from 2013 Almost all crops of cup plants cultivated so far have been established by planting. This can be put down to two reasons: Not only is there a limit to the seed stocks available, the seeding method also poses a higher risk.

N. L. Chrestensen GmbH has solved the first problem more or less by assigning more acreage to the production of seeds and by partly mechanizing the rather labour-intensive seed harvest. According to the information received from N. L. Chrestensen GmbH, there will be sufficient BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

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quantities of seed stock available from 2013, so that larger areas can be cultivated for practical purposes.

The first test areas will be cultivated in practice in Thuringia this year as part of a pilot and demonstration project of the Free State of Thuringia. The findings made in the experiments so far are intended to be put to the test. If the project turns out to be successful, the acreage given over to cultivating the cup plant is to be enlarged in 2013, since only larger fields are attractive for agricultural farms.

However, in order to establish cup plants by seeding, some rules need to be observed. As a matter of principle, only pre-treated seed stock should be sown. The pre-treatment of the seed stock helps breaking the seeds’ natural dormancy. In nature this will be caused by the ever-changing temperatures between seed maturity in autumn and those in the following spring. If untreated seed stock is sown in spring, the seed in the field will germinate slowly and unevenly, with some of the seeds germinating only one year later.

The crop requires a seed quantity of 2 kg/ha; F BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

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the seed will be pre-treated immediately before being sown.

Herbicides Require a Permit

Sowing test with cup plants, plots on the left and right-hand side: treated seed stock; center plot: untreated seed stock

It would, of course, also be possible to sow the seeds in autumn, and they might even germinate almost a 100 per cent in spring.

However, such a procedure would further exacerbate another problem, namely that of weed control. At the moment, there are no herbicides licensed for cup plants and any application of herbicides requires permission according to Article 22 (2) of the Plant Protection Act (PflSchG).

Matters get even more complicated in as much, as cup plants do not agree with all herbicides approved for other composite plants. It is therefore difficult to isolate the crops from the time of sowing until they reach the three- or five-leaf stage. From this stage onwards, which corresponds about to that of newly planted crops, the cup plant tolerates various herbicides, and it can also be weeded with a mechanical hoe. Great efforts are made to approach and solve the problem of weed control, in order to minimize the risks for the farmers. On the whole, the rules for the cup plant seed are similar

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to those applying to fine seed or special seed crops. Special attention must be given to preparing the fields, since they are intended to be used over many years. Before sowing, the soil should be free from weeds, have a fine crumb structure and be reconsolidated, because the seeds’ driving force is relatively weak, despite its thousand grain weight of about 15 g, and must therefore be deposited close to the surface.

Sowing between Mid-May and Late May Due to the recommended sowing period between mid-May and late May, there is still enough time left in spring for weed control by repeatedly tilling the soil and applying a total herbicide, so as to stimulate the germinating process. When sowing the seeds right on time, the cup plant will form a strong rosette in the year of sowing and yield a good crop the following year. If the sowing is left until the second half of June, though, the crop is likely to be thin and meager the following year and, as a result, overgrown with weeds. When sowing with the usual singlegrain sowing machines, 15-18 germinable seeds should be deposited on each square

metre. A distance of 50 - 75 cm between the rows is possible, depending largely on the planting or sowing equipment available on the farm concerned, as well as on the tending measures planned thereafter. But even when all premises are observed, the risk of sowing cup plants remains higher than that of planting them. The reason for that is the weather, as so often in agriculture.

If the moisture remains stable after sowing, the cup plant will start germinating after about 10-14 days and can achieve a field emergency rate of almost 100 per cent, as shown in a field test in Dornburg in 2010.

However, if it does not rain over a longer period, the seeds germinate only partly and dry out. In the case of heavy rainfalls after the sowing, the surface gets crusty and the seedlings‘ driving force is not strong enough to break through this crust. In the last two scenarios, the crop threatens to grow sparsely and in spots only, as happened in 2011 in Dornburg, too.

Both Planting and Sowing Require an Ideal Seed Bed It is for the above reasons that the planting of cup plants, especially on remaining and

splinter areas, or on the land of newcomers, will surely continue to play an important role in the forthcoming years, even if sowing is the more promising technique. When planting the future crop, the same principles will basically apply for the cultivation of cup plants as for sowing. The preparation of the land and its tending in the year of planting/sowing are the most important prerequisites for a successful cultivation of cup plants.

If the plant has formed a strong rosette in autumn, the second year merely requires fertilizing with nitrogen in spring, before the crop can be harvested in autumn. In order to produce 100 kg of dry mass (TM), the cup plant needs almost 1 kg of nitrogen.

It responds positively to being fertilized with recycled products of biogas fermentation.

A field test in Dornburg from 2009 until 2011, when the soil was fertilized only once with 50 mÂł of liquid biogas manure in early spring, resulted in yields comparable to those achieved after the field was treated with mineral or mineral/organic fertilizer, although, theoretically, the quantities of nitrogen available to the cup plants were F

ENGLISH SPECIAL

Fig. 1: Cultivation sites of cup-plants in 2011

Data source: N.L.Chrestensen, Thüringer Landesanstalt für Landwirtschaft (TLL – Thuringian State Agency for Agriculture) Status: April 2011 practical test sites test plots cultivation sites 2010 cultivation sites 2011 (boundaries of the) federal states

Fig. 2: Influence of the harvesting date on the dry mass yield, the methane yield and the methane production from cup-plants, VS Dornburg 2011

resp.

optimal harvesting window

July

harvesting date dry mass yield methane yield

50

methane production

lower. This can possibly be attributed to the dryness in the summers before, when mineral fertilizer was not available to the plants so easily.

The nitrogen legacy after the harvest ranged from 16 to 30 kg/ha in all test years and was therefore fairly low. It is also possible to spray liquid manure after the cup plant harvest, since the plant still develops a relatively high amount of leaf mass until the end of the vegetation period, so that it can absorb the nitrogen quite well. Further macro-nutrients, such as P, K, Mg and Ca, should be replaced every three years on the basis of soil analyses and in accordance with the plants‘ needs. These measures must be aimed at maintaining the content class C as regards P, K and Mg as well as the pH-class C of the soil.

Harvest between Mid-August and Mid-September The cup plant will be harvested with conventional field choppers, when the dry substance content reaches 25 per cent (see photo on page 51). The plants’ mass formation is by and large completed by this time and silage effluent is hardly generated any more in the silo. At the same time, the methane yield of almost 300 standard liters per kg of organic dry substance (Nl/kg oTS) will reach a relatively high level, so that the highest methane output per unit area can be achieved. Depending on the location and the weather at that time, the crop can be harvested between mid-August and midSeptember (see Fig. 2).

Later in the year, the biomass yield will decrease again due to the plants shedding their leaves, the (absolute) methane output and thus the methane yield per unit area will drop. In view of the small field sizes currently used for cultivating cup plants, the harvest and fermentation is suggested together with the early silo maize. A 15-year utilization period can be assumed in view of the single-cut harvest that is common for the substrate production. This will have to be taken into account especially when concluding contracts for leased land. Further information as well as detailed instructions on how to cultivate cup plants can be found under www.tll.de/ainfo or www.chrestensen.de.

This project has been financially supported by the Federal Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Consumer Production (BMELV) via the Fachagentur Nachwachsende Rohstoffe e.

V. (FNR) as the body running the project on behalf of the BMELV. D BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

ENGLISH SPECIAL

Contacts Thüringer Landesanstalt für Landwirtschaft Referat 430 Apoldaer Str. 4 · D-07774 Dornburg-Camburg Andrea Biertümpfel Phone: 00 49 3 64 27 868-116 e-mail: andrea.biertuempfel@tll.thueringen.de Michael Conrad Phone: 00 49 3 64 27 868-131 e-mail: michael.conrad@tll.thueringen.de N. L. Chrestensen GmbH Witterdaer Weg 6 · D-99092 Erfurt Dr. Wolf-Dieter Blüthner (seed growing) Phone: 03 61/22 45-138 e-Mail: dr.w.bluethner@chrestensen.com Ferdinand Scheithauer, (production) Phone: 03 61/22 45-253 e-Mail: f.scheithauer@chrestensen.com Ronald Müller, (field work) Phone: 01 70/8 34 72 55

Cup plant harvest with the chopper in autumn.

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51

ENGLISH SPECIAL

FOTO: HELGA LADE

The promotion of conventional energies between 1970 and 2012 has recieved grants amounting to €65bn for lignite alone.

About Lies Concerning the Energy Change, the Power Prices and the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG) Every day during the entire summer break, the newspapers flashed in their headlines: “Energy change too expensive”, “EEG pushes power prices up”, “Power prices on the increase”, “Renewables to be blamed for high power prices”, etc. Since bad news sell better than good ones (“bad news are good news”), many media, unfortunately, take part in this campaign against the energy change.

By Dipl.-Ing. agr. Bastian Olzem

O

ften enough, only semi-truths are published, with the facts being ignored or twisted. The interested reader will only seldom find a detailed and well researched article on this topic. An exception in this respect is a publication in the weekly DIE ZEIT of August 23, under the headline “Lüge auf der Stromrechnung” (Lie in the electricity bill), which can still be found under http://www.zeit.de/2012/ 35/Gruene-Energie-Energiewende-Strompreisluege/komplettansicht). Therefore the following paper intends to have a closer look at some of the more important topics.

Power Prices; Cost of Power: The Hidden Costs of Electricity Generated from Coal and Nuclear Power The prices shown on the electricity bill do not correspond to the actual costs necessary to generate one kilowatt hour (kWh) from

52

coal, lignite or nuclear power. Full price transparency is only achieved in the case of renewable energies. The allocation stipulated by the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG) and amounting to currently 3.59 cents per kWh is shown on every electricity bill.

Not so the hidden costs of electricity generated from coal and nuclear power. Intransparency is dominating the situation. Consumers pay the additional costs of the electricity generated in conventional power plants via taxes and levies. The conventional energies benefited in the past, and still do so now, from state grants in the form of financial aid, tax concessions and other concessionary measures.

On August 27, the Bundesverband Windenergie (German Wind Energy Assosiation – BWE) organized a press conference, where it presented, jointly with Greenpeace Energy (a supplier of ecologically generated

power), a study entitled “How expensive electricity really is” which the Forum für Ökologisch-Soziale Marktwirtschaft e.V. (Forum for an Ecological-Social Market Economy – FÖS) had prepared. The FÖS has investigated the promotion of conventional energies between 1970 and 2012. The result makes it clear that lignite has received grants amounting to €65bn, hard coal €177bn and nuclear power even €187bn from the state during that period.

Almost 430 Billion Euros from the State for Nuclear Power and Electricity Generated from Coal The state subsidies have thus amounted to altogether 429 billion Euros without taking into account the external costs caused by environmental and climate damage, just to name only two examples. The cumulated subsidies for renewable energies up to the year 2012 merely amount to 54 billion Euro.

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In 2012 alone, the total grants/subsidies spent on the generation of electricity from coal and nuclear power as well as the associated external costs amounted to 40 billion Euros! This amount does not even include all cost pools, such as the entire final storage costs in the case of nuclear power. If this cost pool with its actually existing costs – that the FÖS has established very conservatively – would appear on the electricity bill, the allocation from “conventional” power would amount to 10.2 cents per kWh in 2012.

This means that electricity generated from coal and nuclear power is actually about 10 Cents more expensive than shown as its price on the electricity bill. As compared with the EEG allocation of 3.59 cents/kWh, the allocation for “conventional” power is currently three times as high. And this is only half the truth, as the following section shows.

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The “pure” remuneration payments on the basis of the Renewable Energy Sources Act have caused a “pure” EEG allocation of merely 2.06 cents/kWh in 2012. The difference of 1.53 cents that adds up to the “total EEG allocation” of 3.59 cents/kWh is made up of the following amounts: the privilege to the “energy-intensive” industries (1.0 cents/ kWh), the electricity price at the power stock exchange, which has dropped by 2 cents in comparison with 2008 (0.5 cents/kWh), and the market bonus (0.03 cents/kWh). Hence, the allocation for “conventional” power is even five times higher than the pure EEG allocation in 2012.

This fact clearly exposes the nonsense about the “expensive” power generated from renewable energies (EE) as mere scaremongering aimed at fueling insecurity and thus at hampering the further expansion of renewable energies. Because one thing is clear: The share of 25.1 per cent of the power consumption covered by renewable energies in Germany during the first half year of 2012 has been more or less lost to the old energy concerns. They would therefore like to prevent the loss of further market shares, if possible.

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ENGLISH SPECIAL

In 2012 alone, the total grants/subsidies spent on the generation of electricity from coal and nuclear power as well as the associated external costs amounted to 40 billion Euros.

The cumulated subsidies for renewable energies up to the year 2012 merely amount to 54 billion Euros.

are detrimental to the climate. On this day, the prognosis of the transmission grid operators about the EEG allocation for 2013 will be published. As various newspapers have already reported, it will range from 4.8 to 5.3 cents/kWh. A five in front of the decimal point is more likely. However, this increase by about 1.5 cents per kilowatt hour has not predominantly been caused by the addition of new renewable energy facilities. This would probably account for a maximum increase of the EEG allocation by 0.3 cents/ kWh only. 0.5 cents of the remaining 1.2 cents increase must be attributed to the policy in favor of “energy-intensive” industries.

Exemption Rules to Be Revised In comparison with its predecessor act, the EEG 2012 has introduced further exemption rules for companies. While companies with an annual power consumption of ten gigawatt hours (GWh) were entitled to a staggered exemption from the EEG allocation under the EEG 2011, politics has now lowered this threshold to 1 GWh under the EEG 2012. The number of those who share the EEG allocation costs has thus been considerably reduced, since the 600 or so companies that benefited from the 10 GWh threshold in 2011 represent almost 20 per cent of the German power consumption.

The amendment of the law in 2012 will further and significantly reduce the number of those who bear and share the costs of renewable energy. But even without an increase in the share of power generated from renewable energies, the EEG allocation would have gone up by 0.5 cents/kWh, purely due to the fact that the privileges to these industries have been expanded. Hence, the

54

costs of the EEG are distributed and shared unevenly.

Private Households Fill the Coffers Household customers and small companies pay much more than the companies which are fully or partly exempt from the EEG allocation. This requires urgent amendments, so that only those companies remain exempt from the EEG costs that must really expect disadvantages in international competition due to their high power consumption.

The widely used market bonus will contribute to the increase with about 0.2 cents of the EEG allocation in 2013. The remainder of the increase, i.e. some 0.5 cents/kWh, can be attributed to the decreased electricity price at the power stock exchange. When the price at the power stock exchange decreases, the difference between the EEG remuneration payments and the price for power from renewable energies fetched at the power stock exchange will increase.

Consequently, the EEG differential costs will also increase and thus the EEG allocation. It must be attributed to the “structural defect” inherent in the EEG’s directive for the compensation mechanism that the EEG allocation will always rise, when, say, electricity generated from wind reduces the power price, which is basically welcome.

One could think the renewable energies are victims of their own success, which is absolutely not true. The defect in the said directive needs to be corrected, so that the household customers can eventually benefit from the (positive) impact of renewable energies which decrease power prices. This has not happened so far.

Large Consumers Benefit Twice While the companies with high power consumption are exempt from the EEG allocation, they benefit additionally from the decreased electricity prices at the power stock exchange. These prices have dropped by 2 cents/kWh between 2008 and today.

The energy-intensive industries therefore benefit twice from the EEG, while the household customer is punished twice: Not only does he pay towards the EEG allocation from which the industry is exempt, the decreased power prices are not passed on to him, either.

The fact that consumers pay too much for the electricity they use has recently been confirmed by a study of Gunnar Harms, an energy expert. According to his findings, rebates totaling three billion Euros have been withheld from the consumers in 2012.

The power price would be 2.14 cents lower, if the power suppliers had passed on the price abatements accordingly. At the same time, the concerns are publishing new record figures all the time. According to its own publications, E.on has increased its net profit to €3.1bn in the first half of 2012. As compared with the year before, this is an increase of 230 per cent.

Using the Chances Onstead of Doom Mongering Instead of spreading pessimism and fear, communication should rather focus on presenting the chances of the energy change now. As the newspaper DIE ZEIT puts it aptly: “Germany will become more independent from fossil fuels which will get more and more expensive very soon”. New jobs will be created and new technologies will be developed for the export to more and more countries in the world.

These must be the messages of the forthcoming months, so that people back the energy change and investors take courage again.

Not only the renewable energy sector is irritated, investments into new gas-fired power plants are not made at the moment, either.

It is above all the federal government as a whole which should emphasize the chances and advantages. D

Author Dipl.-Ing. agr. Bastian Olzem Head of the Policy Department Fachverband Biogas e.V. Schumannstr. 17 · D-10117 Berlin Phone: 00 49 30 2 75 81 79 11 e-mail: berlin@biogas.org BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

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22nd Annual Biogas Convention and Trade Exhibition in Leipzig, 29-31 January 2013 Three days with plenary lectures, workshops and best-practice reports | Instructive excursions to selected biogas plants on February 1, 2013 | The world’s largest BIOGAS trade exhibition

“F

it for the future” – is the challenge the biogas sector is faced with in 2013.

The Annual Convention will explore new paths, too: In order to offer the participants a wide range of subjects, the conference strategy has been revised, with the big plenary meeting being replaced by a number of parallel events. Each conference participant can now move from one such parallel event to another, thus arranging his or her “personal” convention.

All three days of the Annual Convention will focus on its central theme “Biogas – fit for the future”, when important subjects are raised and presented in 90-min units. They include topics like ■ Efficiency increase and repowering ■ Innovations and Best Practice ■ Public relations and acceptance ■ Energy plants and substrates

■ Power generation in line with the demand Apart from “Biogas – fit for the future”, there will be talks on leading subjects like “Fermentation of biogenic residues”, “Direct Marketing” and “Technology, Quality and Safety”. First-time participants will be offered “Biogascompact” – the continuation of the strategically successful conference section “Biogas for Newcomers”.

In addition to that, 2013 is dedicated to internationality. The number of simultaneously translated talks will be increased, with Russia and China in the focus of attention.

Members of the Fachverband Biogas e.V. will exclusively be offered workshops again, some of them on subjects like “The 2012 Renewable Energy Sources Act”, “Energy plants”, “Feeding gas into the network” or “Export”. On Friday, February 1, 2013, the conference participants will be taken on sev-

eral instructive excursions to selected biogas plants in the vicinity of the conference venue. By August, more than 220 companies (2012: 176) had already put in their application for the biogas trade exhibition running parallel to the conference. Members of the Fachverband Biogas e.V. are offered concessionary conditions, which also applies to first-time exhibitors at their “newcomer stands”. As in the years before, there will be ample opportunity for personal talks and meetings between the lectures, at the trade exhibition and at the popular evening event.

You can find up-to-date information on the program of the 22nd Annual Convention of the Fachverband Biogas e.V. and on the BIOGAS trade exhibition under www.biogastagung.org.The program will be available online from October and you can register directly. Just come and see! D

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European Biogas Association – EBA

Strong Advocacy in Brussels

T

he European Biogas Association (EBA) was founded in February 2009 as a Belgian non-profit organisation aiming to promote the deployment of sustainable biogas production and use in Europe. Starting with 11 members, all national biogas associations, EBA has grown steadily over the years: currently EBA’s membership comprises altogether 55 national biogas associations, institutes and companies from over 20 countries all across Europe. The member associations cover the majority of producers, companies, consultants and researchers in the field of biogas within Europe. EBA’s strategy defines three priorities: establish biogas as an important part of Europe’s energy mix, promote source separation of household waste to increase the gas potential and support the production of biomethane as vehicle fuel.

EBA’s Brussels office in the Renewable Energy House is run by two staff members Agata Przadka, Technical Advisor, who joined EBA in 2011 and Susanna Litmanen working as a Policy Advisor since June 2012. The Brussels office is primarily responsible for representing the European biogas industry’s interests toward European Institutions and for liaising with and disseminating information to the EBA members.

EBA provides its members with a well established network and a communication platform to exchange information and expertise on biogas. Started in 2011, EBA publishes the annual Biogas Report that includes data on biogas production, biomethane development and support schemes around Europe. Furthermore EBA issues country profiles which deal with country specific biogas data, legislation and future prospects in detail. So far EBA has released the profiles of France, Greece, and Slovakia and is about to finalise the profiles of Italy, Belgium and the United Kingdom. Both, yearly biogas reports and country profiles, are exclusive services for EBA’s members.

Since one of the EBA’s goals is to establish biogas as an essential part of Europe’s energy sources, EU policy activities make up a large part of the daily work. EBA is an active member in several EU expert groups as regards policy issues such as End of Waste criteria, revision of Fertiliser Regulation, and the CEN for standards for bioBIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

methane. In addition, EBA takes its stance on several other policy issues including the revision of Energy Taxation Directive, implementation of new energy, sustainability criteria for biofuels and solid and gaseous biomass, Common Agricultural Policy etc.

One of the actual hot issues in Brussels is the European Commission’s draft proposal on iLUC that suggests, for example, setting a 5 % maximum target for crop-based biofuels and bioliquids. EBA is currently preparing its press release to present its opinion on the proposal. The members receive a summary of the policy issues in each newsletter released around four times a year.

In order to improve the legislation and cross-border knowledge of biogas and biomethane, EBA takes also part in several EUfunded projects which bring together stakeholders from different parts of Europe. The currently running projects include BiogasIN that promotes the development of sustainable biogas markets particularly in Eastern Europe, Green Gas Grids, aiming to boost biomethane markets across the continent and the new project called European Sustainable Biofuels Forum which aims at spreading extensive and accurate information on the state of play of European biofuels.

EBA collaborates with several other associations in the field of renewable and sustainable energies in order to strengthen the common message on greener energy Europe. EBA is member of European Biomass Association (AEBIOM), European Renewable Energy Federation (EREF) and European Biowaste Alliance. Within the EU-funded projects, EBA’s close partners include for example Natural and bio Gas Vehicles Association (NGVA), different bio-

fuels associations and national energy institutes.

In June 2012 EBA organised its first biogas conference in Bratislava, Slovakia. The conference proved to be a success with over 100 participants from all over Europe. The participants appreciated the opportunity for networking and exchange of information on different topics around biogas such as policy framework, technology review and business environment. Speakers comprised international biogas industry experts and policymakers from the European and the national levels. Since the conference fulfilled all expectations, EBA will continue organising such an event either annually or every two years. The decision of the timing and the location of the next biogas conference will be made in the following few weeks by EBA’s board members. D

Author Susanna Litmanen Policy Advisor European Biogas Association

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ENGLISH SPECIAL

European Biogas Association 24 Countries - 27 National Organisations - 27 Companies Austria Belgium Czech Republic Estonia Finland France France France Germany Germany Greece Great Britain Great Britain Hungary Ireland Italy Latvia Lithunia Luxembourg Poland Poland Romania Slovakia Spain Sweden Switzerland

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(ARGE Kompost & Biogas) (ValBiom – Wallonian Biogas Association) (C˘eská bioplynová asociace) (Eesti Biogaasi Assotsiatsioon MTÜ) (Suomen Biokaasuyhdistys) (ATEE Club Biogaz and Méthéor) (Association Energie Développement Environnement) (Association pour la Méthanisation Écologique des déchets) (Fachverband Biogas and FNBB) (Fördergesellschaft für nachhaltige Biogas- und Bioenergienutzung e.V.) (Hellenic Biogas Association) (The Anaerobic Digestion and Biogas Association Ltd.) (REA – Biogas Group) (Magyar Biogáz Egyesület) (Irish Biomass Association IrBEA) (Consorzio Italiano Biogas) (Latvijas Bigazes Asociacija) (Bioduju Asociacija) (Biogasvereenegung) (Polskie Stowarzyszenie Biogazu) (Polish Economic Chamber of Renewable Energy) (Asociatia Romana Pentru Biogaz) (Asociácia výrobcov energie z obnovite ných zdrojov AVEOZ) (Asociación Española de Biogás AEBIG) (Energiegas Sverige) (Biomasse Schweiz)

BIOGAS Journal | ENGLISH EDITION 2012

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