Biofuels: Potential Being Realized?

With greater environmental awareness and the growing desire to make the best use of potential and existing fuel stocks the global energy landscape is changing. As countries aim for domestic energy security and try to minimize environmental impact and the effect of variable fuel costs, there has been a continued push to diversify and examine alternate or non-traditional fuel sources. One such sector that is attracting attention is biofuels.

Biofuels can be described as any fuel (liquid or gaseous) that is derived from biomass -any recently living organisms or their waste byproducts – and is recognized as a carbon-neutral, renewable energy source.
Large-scale production of biofuel-generated electricity for inclusion into the mains grid is a possibility being discussed by governments across world. However, biogas rather than biodiesel may hold the key to being able to provide a reliable supply to industrial-scale power plants.

Biogas is produced by the process of anaerobic digestion of organic material, such as sewage and landfill. To date, its utilization remains relatively small-scale, and biogas projects are often referred to as waste-to-energy projects. The UK’s Ener-G Group is involved in a project in South Africa, which will see landfill gas from Johannesburg City Council’s landfill sites ultimately generate 25 MW of electricity.

There are signs however, that both large businesses and governments are thinking seriously about biogas’ large-scale potential, since it is possible to purify it to the quality of natural gas, and it can be fed through existing gas line infrastructure.

PennEnergy