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English Issue Biogas Journal | Spring_2021 Seven biogas plants supply one gas feed-in plant A majority of the biogas plants in the state of Rhineland- Palatinate are located in the Bitburg-Prüm district (Eifel region). Most of them were commissioned in the period from 2009 to 2011, but some as early as 2001. Now the operators are asking themselves how things will continue when the funding by the Renewable Energy Sources Act (EEG) expires. By Marie-Luise Schaller, EUR ING Wolfgang Francois and Jürgen Neuß in front of the raw gas storage unit of the treatment plant. The regional energy provider, the Stadtwerke Trier (SWT) public utility, is working on incorporating the proven potential of the regional biogas producers into the future energy supply strategy. In the “Regional Interconnection System Western Eifel”, [Regionales Verbundsystem Westeifel] the Eifel municipal networks (Kommunale Netze Eifel (KNE), established in 2009 by the Bitburg-Prüm district (Eifel region) and the SWT) connect the long-term security of the drinking water supply with the improvement of the structures for expanding renewable energies. The core component of this infrastructure project, the only one of its kind in the country, is an 80 kilometre long pipeline route for drinking water, electricity and broadband lines as well as biogas and natural gas pipelines. It runs from the boundary with the state of North Rhine- Westphalia in the north to the region around Trier in the south. To Arndt Müller, technical management director of the SWT, it is important to make the best possible use of the existing, abundant renewable energies by constructing a flexible system in connection with biogas. As a result, he became one of the primary initiators of another cooperative solution which supports the repowering of the biogas plants. H. Berg & Partner, an engineering firm based in Aachen, provided guidance for design and planning for the initial feasibility analyses produced in 2013, which examined the idea of connecting several operations to one biogas collection pipeline in order to treat the biogas on a large scale in a central plant and then to feed it into the new natural gas interconnected grid system. The participants founded their own company, Biogaspartner Bitburg GmbH, for this purpose. Company partners are the Stadtwerke Trier (SWT), the private disposal business Luzia Francois and the Landwerke Eifel AöR public utility. In turn, the following are partners in the Landwerke Eifel AöR: the Eifel municipal networks (KNE), the Bitburg-Prüm district (Eifel region), the Bitburg public utility and the collective municipality Bitburger Land, the community of Speicher, the Südeifelwerke AöR public utility and the water works associations Trier-Land and Kylltal. A gas collection pipeline 42 kilometres long The idea didn’t stop here. The 42 kilometre long biogas collection pipeline was laid in an east-to-west direction, seven biogas plants were connected and in February 2020, start-up operation began for the central gas treatment after a construction period of just six months. Wolfgang Francois, managing director of Biogaspartner Bitburg GmbH, remembers the challenging time during which he and his partners were developing the project: “The complexity and size of the project required numerous, intense discussions in order to convince the farmers to connect their plants to the collection pipephoto: Marie-Luise Schaller 38
Biogas Journal | Spring_2021 English Issue photo: ETW Energietechnik GmbH line. They are experienced experts in biogas production, which is their contribution to the project. Their participation in the project offers them prospects for the period after which the EEG funding expires. The banks also needed specific clarification in view of the tremendous dimensions of the project so that project financing could be secured.” In addition, he continues, the amendments to the EEG always generated new challenges with regard to costeffectiveness, which continually forced the partners to develop new strategies. “In general, we focus on reducing costs to a competitive level and on developing business models that don’t rely on EEG funding and that contribute to the success of the energy transition by producing green gas.” And in this sense, the contribution of this large project is quite impressive. Jürgen Neuß, managing director at the H. Berg & Partner engineering firm, notes that in the future, about 40 percent of the natural gas used by Bitburg will be replaced by the infeed of biogas from the treatment plant of Biogaspartner Bitburg GmbH. That is almost exactly equivalent to the amount required by the Bitburger brewery, one of the largest and most distinguished private breweries. As a partner, the Stadtwerke Trier public utility plays a key role because it takes care of the regional and transregional distribution of the biomethane, which keeps the value in the region. Wolfgang Francois explains: “A significant future issue for us and our partners is that we will soon begin marketing biogas as fuel for the public transport of the SWT and for heavy cargo traffic. The division responsible for the public transport of SWT and the location at the middle of the industrial park at the Bitburg airport play a helpful role here.” PSA gas treatment plant of Biogaspartner Bitburg GmbH with a raw gas capacity of 1,800 nm³/h. Just Premium Ultra Premium Efficiency NEW: Submersible mixer GTWSB 206-E · With energy efficiency motor: efficiency > 96% · Corresponds to efficiency class IE5 · Optimized hub and propeller geometry for even more smoothness and thrust · Approved up to a substrate temperature of 65 ° C · Long service life Franz Eisele u. Söhne GmbH & Co. KG Hauptstr. 2-4 · D-72488 Sigmaringen · Phone +49 7571 109-0 www.eisele.de 39 Knowledge in motion
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