24 August 2011

What Is The Likely Future Scale Of Replenishable Energy In Climate Change Mitigation?

Like them
or not, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has done more thinking about climate change and how society might change its habits to avoid the worst effects of rising temperatures than any other group of people, so I would suggest that the Anaerobic Digestion Community should take note of what the IPCC publishes.

That's why I was interested when on 9 May this year, the IPCC released a special report on the role of renewable energy in mitigating climate change. In this article, which is based on an interview with Georgie Weedon and published in Nature Climate Change (Vo. 1, June 2011), we have summarised the notes which were published when he spoke to Ottmar Edenhofer, chair of the working group behind the report, about its key findings and implications.

The report was commissioned by a number of world governments who asked the Intergovernmental Panel on Global Warming to offer an evaluation of the potential role of renewables in offsetting global warming. The report investigates the role of numerous technologies like wind, biomass, solar and geothermal energy in the worldwide energy mix, and it also examines the amount to which the deployment of replenishable energy is consistent with energy security, climate policy, and also with accelerating human development, particularly in developing nations.

The main conclusions of the report are that by the middle of the century, the proportion of renewables in the worldwide energy mix may be from thirty percent to round about eighty percent. Also, though renewables will play a crucial role, there's more than one way to achieve a low-carbon economy. The report formulates alternative paths to make certain shareholders and policymakers actually understand the choices.

It proves that improving energy security and human development, and implementing climate policy are all consistent with impressively large scale deployment of renewable power. But, quite naturally it's up to our statesmen and shareholders in a large number of businesses worldwide to choose what extent they develop the potential identified.

Biomass is considered by some as of arguable benefit, due to the demand it places on land use. To what degree the usage of biomass is supportable is a contrary issue.

I suppose that most of all I was disappointed that in this discussion and presumably therefore within the report as well, there was no distinction made between anaerobic digestion of waste biomass, and biomass from food crops. It was disappointing that the point was not made that a lot of biomass would come from what have previously be considered to be waste materials such as manures and organic sludges. I fail to see what there can be any argument about the undoubted benefit from producing “renewables” from waste organic matter.

One critical element in deciding the role of biomass energy will be expectancies and the prophecies for future rural productiveness. With reasonable land-use management and with a fair increase in rural productivity we will be able to quite definitely afford a bit more biomass use without damaging biodiversity and food security.
The report is explicit about these underlying unknowns create such a wide band of predicted utilization and plans to raise the profile about how biomass may be employed in a viable way, within the stakeholder community. Currently bio-energy use is at an especially low level and it can be increased in a supportable way. For appropriate development it needs policy and reasonable management practices to be developed in the rural sector.

Only 14% of global electricity production comes from nuclear power, and many established bodies, eg the World Energy Agency and even the IPCC, say that the proportion of nuclear power for electricity production might decline over a period of time. This suggests that almost all of the electricity production will come from alternative sources like coal, oil and gas, and also from renewables. One critical point is that we've got a lot of coal, oil and gas underground, and without a price on carbon or climate policy we'll use coal. This can increase emissions around the world. This is what we are expecting and thus a mix of renewable power policy and climate policy is needed to reduce emissions and to provide secure and supportable energy.

The report implies that global warming itself can impede the capability for clean energy - by changing wind speeds, as an example.

The report covers the genuine “levelized” value of energy, and the IPCC have considered 164 eventualities to show the potential range of chances. That's due to the fact that they wanted to show more than one pathway to clean energy, to open the space for policymakers to work in.

Solar and biomass are the biggest current sources of replenishable energy. Which may or may not make them the most promising contenders in the future worldwide energy mix as the future it is completely dependent on how policy evolves. Biomass has a crucial part to play if you want to reduce carbon-dioxide emissions, it's a mitigation option. But if there isn't any climate policy, the contribution of biomass would be smaller. Solar electricity has the biggest technical potential.

The largest obstructions to making the switch to replenishable energy are now diminishing. In the past, the expenses for renewable operators were huge.

Regardless of whether you remove the consequences of assistance, most green energy sources were simply not competitive during the past. The most important stumbling blocks now are the issues of integration and the expenses. Also, the deployment of renewables is dependent on having a strong climate policy. It's important to make money from capital in the market when there's a trustworthy carbon price, investment straight away becomes competitive.

The report shows that the developing countries are developing as world figureheads in renewable power generation.

The IPCC Special Report on Renewable Power Sources and Global Warming Mitigation was released in May 2011 and is obtainable from http://srren.org

Georgie Weedon is a journalist and communications specialist based in London, UK. e-mail: georgie [[@]] gingerwinkmedia.cc4

Investment In Waste Infrastructure Creates More Jobs And Saves More Carbon Than Investment In Wind Farms

The ESA, the voice of the waste and resource management sector, today (Monday) publishes a new report quantifying the economic growth potential of the waste management sector and comparing its impact on jobs and carbon emissions with that of wind farms.

Matthew Farrow, ESA Director of Policy, said:
“The Government has been overly focused on high profile green sectors such as wind power and electric vehicles. Important as these may be, with the economy stumbling and having just adopted very tough carbon budgets, the Government is missing a trick if it does not act to realise the potential of the waste management sector.
Pound for pound, investment in waste infrastructure creates more jobs and saves more carbon emissions than investment in wind farms. Tomorrow’s Waste Review announcement must show the Government recognises the potential of the sector to deliver real ‘green growth.’”
The report, entitled Green growth: don’t waste the opportunity’ compares the jobs created and emissions saved by a £1bn investment in a representative ‘basket’ of waste management infrastructure with the same amount invested in onshore wind turbines. It finds that the waste infrastructure investment creates over four times more jobs (3,000 compared to 650), as well as saving much more carbon emissions (4 million tonnes compared to 1.4 million tonnes).

The report also quantifies the economic impact of the waste infrastructure investment needed to deliver the UK’s targets for waste management enshrined in EU law:

• Total investment needed by 2020: £7.5bn to £20bn (depending on mix of waste technologies deployed)
• Permanent £2bn increase in GDP
• 20,000 construction jobs supported during construction
• 25,000 permanent jobs created in the facilities

The ESA is calling on the Government, in the Waste Review, to put in place the investment framework that will enable the waste management sector to go forward with its investment plans. This framework must include:

• A clear place for energy from waste in energy policy
• A more predictable planning system for waste infrastructure
• A crackdown on illegal waste businesses which undermine the investments of responsible firms.

See more at the ESA website.

20 August 2011

How Much does an Anaerobic Digestion Plant Cost?

We are often asked how much an Anaerobic Digestion Plant costs, and of course, a plant can cost "not much", or "a great deal of money" depending on the scale of the plant, and the degreee of sophistication built into it. plus many other factors. That's not a very helpful answer, is it? So, how about the following:

Capital Cost of an On-farm Anaerobic Digester

The capital cost of an on-farm anaerobic digester ranges from approximately $400,000 to $5,000,000, depending on the size of the operation and technology used, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency AgSTAR. An average on-farm anaerobic digestion plant costs around $1.2 million. The cost of a unit varies depending on its size, design, and features. 

The type of anaerobic digester required for your operation, and thus the cost, varies depending on technical factors and the number of livestock. Similarly, most digesters are somewhat customised by the provider, so capital outlay as well as operating and maintenance costs vary. 

When calculating the cost of an anaerobic digestion system, annual operation and maintenance costs — repairs, parts, labour, and insurance — must also be considered. via https://www.epa.gov/agstar

What makes this question of cost even more difficult is that the developers of these plants quite reasonably, consider their costs to be commercially sensitive information and rarely publish information on their costs.

The UK government's waste technology development encouraging quango "WRAP", has done a good job in recent years by publishing a comparative table of the range of costs for different technologies to "dispose" of waste for the different solid waste treatment technologies, but their pricing suffers like the rest of us from the dearth of data, and their price guidance is based on just a few examples.

Case Study: Cost Information for a Large Council Anaerobic Anaerobic Digestion Plant

That is why it was good to see that the Fife Council, Scotland, which is seeking to develop new biowaste processing infrastructure on land under its control at its existing Lochhead Landfill site near Dunfermline, has published the contract award price (in the Award Notice), for their new plant on the EU's Official "Tenders online database" (TEDs).

Meme about Anaerobic Digestion Plant Cost.

The price they give is admittedly for their very site-specific solution to building an AD Plant to meet the needs of the local community, as part of Scotland's Zero Waste to landfill targets, so it is only typical of this type of plant.

The proposed facility will utilise AD as a central component of its processing technology and will have the capacity to process a minimum of 43,000 tonnes per annum of source segregated biowaste feedstocks (comprising food waste, garden waste, and commercial organic wastes). We are also told that the plant will also be designed to maximise the methane content of the biogas generated by the process, for subsequent energy recovery.

The new facility will be operated by Council's own staff and will provide facilities for feedstock reception, storage, handling, processing, and management (including maturation, refinement, and storage prior to export) of the process by-products, which will include digestate and biogas energy.

The plant design must is required to meet the technical standard for processing Category 3 materials under the applicable Animal By-Products Regulations in Scotland and must achieve a digestate standard that as a minimum, complies with the quality requirements of BSI PAS:110 Specification for Digestate.

The successful contractor Luddon has been engaged by the Council to carry out the design, construction, commissioning, and performance testing of this new biowaste plant and this will include specialist training of nominated Council staff in AD process operation.

The Contract Award cost is £14, 980 463,01 GBP excluding VAT - which it is understood that the Council being a public body, would not normally be required to pay, so the predicted price of an Anaerobic Digestion Plant is in this example (not including running costs), in round figures - £15 million GBP.

We hope that through reading this case study we have helped you to find out how much an anaerobic digestion plant costs.

Find out more about the Contractor at http://www.luddon.co.uk

07 August 2011

Biffa Awards AD Ground Breaking Digestate Recycling Contract to 4Recycling

20 July 2011, original source: edie newsroom

The edie Newsroom has reported that Biffa, the operator of the soon to be fully commissioned Anaerobic Digestion Plant at the Poplars Landfill, has awarded the contract to manage and market their AD digestate to to 4Recycling.


This is dubbed as a recycling contract, but many view AD digestate as a product in its own right.

4Recycling has been awarded the 3-year duration contract by Biffa to recycle their digestate from a their anaerobic digestion (AD) facility at Poplars, near Cannock in Staffordshire.

Production of digestate from the facility, which has the capacity to process 120,000 tonnes of waste per annum, is likely to commence later in the year.

The digestate will be produced to PAS 110 standard and 4Recycling will provide a technical, transport and recycling service for both solids and liquids working with local contractors and landowners to provide a continuous service for the plant.

4R Group's managing director, Mike Holt, is reported by edie.net to have said: "We are really pleased to be supporting Biffa on this important contract."

"Our team have decades of experience in developing recycling outlets for organic materials, delivering huge carbon savings by substituting out fossil-derived fertilizers in agriculture or bringing brownfield land back into use."

Read the full article at edie.net here

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