http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+
years, but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.

On 3/28/2017 2:51 PM, Harry Bloomfield wrote:
http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+
years, but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.

Havn't heard anything about the Ambridge one for a while.

On Tuesday, 28 March 2017 14:51:37 UTC+1, Harry Bloomfield wrote:
http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+
years, but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.

Great technology for the 3rd world. China has been issuing grants for small farm installations. The cheapest version of this technology is nothing more than a giant polythene bag plug plastic tube going to a one ring burner.

How it adds up in this country I don't know. There is the potential to dry the slurry then burn it too.


NT

Tim Streater explained on 28/03/2017 :
In article , Harry Bloomfield
wrote:

http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+ years,
but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.

It does however involve the usual FIT theft.

Where does the slurry, "biocrops" etc come from, how far, and what cost
is involved in doing that as opposed to doing something else with the
slurry etc.

IOW, what are the actual economics when the FIT theft is removed?

The slurry seems to be augured into the tank, the gas collected,
pressurised, then fed to the generator system. I don't know how much
power it actually generates, but the substation and overhead outgoing
lines are quite substantial.

My guess as a past observer of the installation, is one of seeing the
slurry being brought in on carts, by tractors, obviously from other
local farms.

On Tuesday, 28 March 2017 14:51:37 UTC+1, Harry Bloomfield wrote:
http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+
years, but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.

It has been done for decades a sewage works.
ISTR there are grants for biogas installations.

They are not very efficient using ****, a lot of CO2 is produced as well as methane.

Tim Streater laid this down on his screen :
In article , Harry Bloomfield
wrote:

Tim Streater explained on 28/03/2017 :
In article , Harry Bloomfield
wrote:

http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

pressurised, then fed to the generator system. I don't know how much power
it actually generates, but the substation and overhead outgoing lines are
quite substantial.

250kW.

So probably not much output for a lot of investment building the
facility then? It looks more impressive than its its output.

On 28/03/2017 14:51, Harry Bloomfield wrote:
http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+
years, but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.


If they are not growing their own energy crops on the farm then its
probably not that 'green'. I wonder if it is financially viable without
a feed in tariff subsidy?

--
mailto: news {at} admac {dot] myzen {dot} co {dot} uk

On 28/03/17 14:51, Harry Bloomfield wrote:
http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+
years, but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.


It's a great way to deal with waste, keeping methane out of the
atmosphere and recoup a bit of energy. It's a crap way to generate energy.

Energy crops are madness in the uk. They only make sense where you have
prairies to spare. Here the more energy crops you grow the more food you
have to import, and it is a desperately inefficient way of making energy.

The economics are all about subsidies. Agriculture is subsidised, the
crops are moved with subsidised diesel and then the AD produces
subsidised gas or electricity through a feed-in tarrif.

There may be reasons to pay for clean waste disposal but AD plants
running on crops are just scams really, making money out of mis directed
subsidies. A bit like being a benefits scrounger only you wear tweeds
and drive a Range Rover.

It will doubtless be worse after brexit.

Tim w

On Tuesday, 28 March 2017 18:42:05 UTC+1, Harry Bloomfield wrote:
Tim Streater laid this down on his screen :
In article , Harry Bloomfield
wrote:

Tim Streater explained on 28/03/2017 :
In article , Harry Bloomfield
wrote:

http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

pressurised, then fed to the generator system. I don't know how much power
it actually generates, but the substation and overhead outgoing lines are
quite substantial.

250kW.

So probably not much output for a lot of investment building the
facility then? It looks more impressive than its its output.

Of the facility I saw there wasn't much to it, just a huge tank plus a CO2 separator.


NT

On Tue, 28 Mar 2017 17:06:05 +0100, Chris Hogg wrote:


AIUI the feed for these small-scale biodigesters is a mix of farmyard
slurry, i.e. runny cow ****, and crop residues such as stems, haulms,
stubble etc. Under normal circumstances, the slurry would be sprayed
back onto the fields, providing a modest amount of 'organic'
fertiliser for crops, and the crop waste would either be ploughed
back, also to fertilise the soil and improve its structure, or made
into silage, hay, straw or even just burnt off in the fields, although
I think that last practice is declining and may even be a thing of the
past now.
Stubble burning has been banned in the UK since 1993 to all intents
and purposes.

The runny cow **** can be produced in huge quantities which produces
storage problems , it also cannot be spread on the land at certain
times in case the nitrates it contains contaminates the water table or
watercourses so farmers are prohibited from spreading it for most of
the Winter.
That exasperates the storage problems so getting rid of it another way
can alleviate the problem.

If these biogas generators are going to be widely adopted, then the
traditional uses for their feed will have to be replaced by something
else. But stuff that would otherwise have just been burnt off, is
being usefully used.

G.Harman

On 28/03/17 19:08, alan_m wrote:
On 28/03/2017 14:51, Harry Bloomfield wrote:
http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+
years, but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.


If they are not growing their own energy crops on the farm then its
probably not that 'green'. I wonder if it is financially viable without
a feed in tariff subsidy?

Almost no 'green' solutions are viable without subsidy.

--
"When one man dies it's a tragedy. When thousands die it's statistics."

Josef Stalin

On 29/03/17 01:23, wrote:
That exasperates the storage problems

ITYM exacerbates....

--
"When one man dies it's a tragedy. When thousands die it's statistics."

Josef Stalin

On 28/03/2017 19:08, alan_m wrote:
On 28/03/2017 14:51, Harry Bloomfield wrote:
http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+
years, but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.


If they are not growing their own energy crops on the farm then its
probably not that 'green'. I wonder if it is financially viable without
a feed in tariff subsidy?


It's more about capital costs, which are apparently going down quite
quickly (from 2010). What little I know is from this:

http://www.reaseheath.ac.uk/wp-conte...port-final.pdf

And netting everything down is complicated by tax (CCL for example) as
well as FIT subsidy. And a load of other stuff, like uses for waste heat.

Seems that it might, suitably scaled, stack up in the not too distant
future according to that report.



--
Cheers, Rob

On 28/03/2017 19:36, TimW wrote:
On 28/03/17 14:51, Harry Bloomfield wrote:
http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+
years, but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.


It's a great way to deal with waste, keeping methane out of the
atmosphere and recoup a bit of energy. It's a crap way to generate energy.

Energy crops are madness in the uk. They only make sense where you have
prairies to spare. Here the more energy crops you grow the more food you
have to import, and it is a desperately inefficient way of making energy.

The economics are all about subsidies. Agriculture is subsidised, the
crops are moved with subsidised diesel and then the AD produces
subsidised gas or electricity through a feed-in tarrif.

There may be reasons to pay for clean waste disposal but AD plants
running on crops are just scams really, making money out of mis directed
subsidies. A bit like being a benefits scrounger only you wear tweeds
and drive a Range Rover.

It will doubtless be worse after brexit.

Tim w

Table 31 (p.118) of that report I linked to upthread gives some
interesting projections (to my untrained eye). And break-even based on a
20% capital return.

Now, if it was state run . . . ;-)

--
Cheers, Rob

On Wed, 29 Mar 2017 04:06:10 +0100, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

On 29/03/17 01:23, wrote:
That exasperates the storage problems

ITYM exacerbates....

Correct. Comes from trying to complete and send the post by a low bed
site light before the missus says "you are on that dam Internet"
again.

G.Harman

On Tuesday, 28 March 2017 19:36:04 UTC+1, TimW wrote:
On 28/03/17 14:51, Harry Bloomfield wrote:
http://www.ionacapital.co.uk/page/11...Hay-Biogas.htm

It seems to run 24/7 and has done so far as I know, for at least 2+
years, but what do the experts think?

We are staying just a short walk away from the installation.


It's a great way to deal with waste, keeping methane out of the
atmosphere and recoup a bit of energy. It's a crap way to generate energy.

Energy crops are madness in the uk. They only make sense where you have
prairies to spare. Here the more energy crops you grow the more food you
have to import, and it is a desperately inefficient way of making energy.

The economics are all about subsidies. Agriculture is subsidised, the
crops are moved with subsidised diesel and then the AD produces
subsidised gas or electricity through a feed-in tarrif.

There may be reasons to pay for clean waste disposal but AD plants
running on crops are just scams really, making money out of mis directed
subsidies. A bit like being a benefits scrounger only you wear tweeds
and drive a Range Rover.

This one runs on cow****.

On Tue, 28 Mar 2017 17:06:05 +0100, Chris Hogg wrote:


AIUI the feed for these small-scale biodigesters is a mix of farmyard
slurry, i.e. runny cow ****, and crop residues such as stems, haulms,
stubble etc.

The ones that I know of get most of their biogas production from maize
silage or sugar beet, one makes use of whey from a cheese making
operation. These high energy inputs are what keeps the biogas
generation stable. The slurry contains the methanogenic bugs from the
cows' rumens that produce the methane and CO2 from the "volatile
solids" in the feedstock. The thing is volatile solids is the food
value in a crop, so much of these are used up in normal digestion,
hence the crops grown especially are used.

I worked at a food waste plant that wet composted commercial waste
(still fit for human consumption), which would once have gone for pig
swill, the heat from the process pasteurised the waste which was then
spread on land. Subsequently the plant has been sold and changed to
anaerobic digestion for producing electricity, in engines and
generators the heat from which keeps the digester at blood
temperature, but in addition to the food waste it contracts local
farmers to grow 200 acres of maize for silage.

As well as the gate fee for the food waste I think the plant depends
of the FIT.



Under normal circumstances, the slurry would be sprayed
back onto the fields, providing a modest amount of 'organic'
fertiliser for crops, and the crop waste would either be ploughed
back, also to fertilise the soil and improve its structure,

Digestate is still stored and then spread on the land, often the
solids are separated out for later application and the liquid is used
to irrigate all the time the soil is warm enough for the plants to
make use of it.

AJH

Chris Hogg wrote:

On Wed, 29 Mar 2017 08:18:04 +0100, Chris Hogg wrote:

On Wed, 29 Mar 2017 01:23:13 +0100, wrote:


The runny cow **** can be produced in huge quantities which produces
storage problems , it also cannot be spread on the land at certain
times in case the nitrates it contains contaminates the water table or
watercourses so farmers are prohibited from spreading it for most of
the Winter.
That exasperates the storage problems so getting rid of it another way
can alleviate the problem.

But the biogas generator won't get rid of the nitrates, which will
remain in the digester, and ultimately get spread back on the land,
according to the OP's link, so the problem of timing that spreading to
prevent nitrates contaminating the water table still exists.

Which I've just realised answers the question about finding a
replacement for the 'organic' fertiliser in farm slurry with an
inorganic one. That in fact won't be necessary if the biogas residue
is used back on the land.

Nitrogen containing fertiliser is a large scale industrial product, so
there must still be appropriate times and places when it can be used.
Even if ecologists are still not keen on it.


--

Roger Hayter