Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
upgrading plant itself, but the continuous provision of nominal raw gas
flows and high availabilities of post-processes (e.g. grid injection station or
filling station) also have a significant influence on nominal load operations
of upgrading plants.
Short downtime, good functionality of equipment to enable operation of
the plant at rated load and the continuous availability of sufficient raw gas
are decisive criteria for the high availability of a biogas upgrading plant.
Quick response times for essential maintenance and thus good service
networks supported by technology providers are vital. Furthermore, many
plant suppliers offer remote monitoring of the treatment plant. The
advantage of this is that, when operation is disrupted, the manufacturer's
specialists can find the fault directly and - depending on the type of fault -
take necessary remedial action immediately. This avoids delays such as
when a service technician must travel a long distance to the site.
15.5 Conclusion
Many of today's methods for CO
2
/CH
4
separation are based on other
industrial applications that have been in service for several decades. There
are several methods available, as described in this chapter, that can be seen
as state-of-the-art for biogas upgrading. Within recent years several
developments have led to decreased energy consumption, increased recovery
rates and reduced methane emissions to the atmosphere. The current trends
show that, depending on the upgrading method, technology providers are
trying to decrease specific electricity demands (but often by accepting
reduced product gas pressures), decrease required temperature levels for
desorption processes (amine scrubbers), develop membranes with higher
selectivities for CO
2
/CH
4
, advance technologies for the provision of
liquefied biomethane and combine technologies (e.g. membrane and
cryogenic processes). These developments indicate that,
in the future,
more efficient and also new technologies will be available.
Depending on price levels (especially for natural gas), available
infrastructure and national legal framework conditions, biomethane can
become one of the most promising renewable energy carriers. The
flexibilities of biomethane with respect to storage capability, local and
temporal decoupling of production and utilization as well as applicability in
several utilization paths form,
in combination,
the unique feature of
biomethane.
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