The anaerobic digestion process producing biogas
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The Netherlands - Zeewolde - Cow manure energy plant to supply heat for 3000 homes
On Wednesday January the 7th, inhabitants of a new housing development project in the rural Dutch City of Zeewolde, Province of Flevoland, got their homes heated by "green energy" produced from cow manure. The energy comes from biogas, produced by a process know as anaerobic digestion. At Zeewolde's new plant the raw materials for the digestion process are mainly supplied by local cattle farms. The gas from this digestion plant goes some 5 km's via pipeline to the heat producing energy plant in Zeewolde with an electrical capacity of 1.3 megawatts. By the end of this year some 3000 homes will get their heat from this process.
Biogas is a mixture of gases, usually carbon dioxide and methane. It is produced by a few kinds of microorganisms, mainly when either air or oxygen is absent. Animals that eat a lot of plant material, particularly grazing animals, such as cattle, produce large amounts of biogas, which can be turned into energy. Most plants of the Zeewolde kind use raw material consisting of 50% liquid and solid manure, with the remaining proportion made up on the basis of maize and various other organic products.
There are approximately 60 biogas plants currently operating in the Netherlands, with a forecasted potential of some 400 additional plants.
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