New plant in Hamburg produces biogas from sewage treatment
Die Welt
A biogas plant has started operation in Hamburg which can supply around 5,700 households with energy by producing methane from the city’s largest sewage treatment facility, Julia Witte writes in Die Welt. The plant, known as Gala, converts the fermentation gas produced during wastewater treatment into pure methane by removing constituents such as carbon dioxide and hydrogen sulphide. The gas can then be processed and fed into the city’s network. The facility is the second at the Hamburg Wasser site and nearly triples the previous processing capacity by adding 1,350 cubic meters per hour of feed volume, Witte writes. Udo Bottlaender, managing director of the Gasnetz Hamburg gas network, said the commissioning of the Gala 2 plant makes it possible to save 12,000 tons of CO2 emissions per year by replacing fossil natural gas with renewable biogas.
The introduction of feed-in tariffs for renewables in 2000 boosted the installation of bioenergy plants across Germany and has helped green the heating sector. Farmers have also taken to bioenergy production as a popular sideline.
