Germany’s largest biogas-to-grid plant is now up and running at Könnern, near Halle. The environmentally-friendly biogas is to be fed directly into the Mitteldeutsche Gasversorgung GmbH (MITGAS) supply network and will contribute to the gas supply requirements of some 190,000 people in the Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt regions.
Dr. Jens Horn, managing director of MITGAS, sees bio natural gas as having the potential to replace part of Germany’s natural gas imports. “We are planning to supply around 42 million kilowatt-hours of bio natural gas annually, via the existing network – primarily to customers with combined heat and power facilities, but also to domestic consumers and natural gas filling stations.” MITGAS’s supply network covers the German states of Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and part of Thuringia.
In Könnern, agri.capital GmbH will generate in excess of 10 million normal cubic metres (Nm³) of raw biogas annually and prepare some 6 million Nm³ of bio natural gas. The plant’s four digesters convert around 50,000 tons of slurry, grain and corn silage into biogas. The raw gas is then treated in the processing plant’s pressurized water scrubbing facility to produce methane. Propane gas is then added, in order to give the bio natural gas its necessary calorific value. In the final stage of processing, the gas is pressurised and provided with the very specific natural gas warning odour. The biogas is then ready to be fed into the natural gas supply network.
agri.capital’s Könnern facility is the first of five new biomethane plants currently either under construction or in the planning and development stage. The Münster-based company is one of Germany’s largest energy providers, with 37 biogas facilities capable of producing a total of 30 megawatts (MW) of electrical power based on biogas. Further plants with a total capacity of over 70 MW are currently already under construction or in the planning and development phase.