The view from India Why the time is now right for India’s biogas industry
By Gaurav Kedia, Founder and Chairman of the Indian Biogas Association According to research by the Indian Ministry of Renewable Energies, using waste from the country’s sugar mills alone could generate up to 5,000 MW of electricity from biogas. A further 650m tonnes of available biomass materials could provide an additional 18,000 MW. If this opportunity is realised, it would equate to 20 per cent of India’s annual electricity demand being met by biogas, from nearly 700 TWh.
the atmosphere. Using biomethane to substitute conventional fuels and supplement other renewable sources of energy is also a positive. The benefits of the industry are now being recognised and a proper financial case for biogas is really starting to stack up. A report by Daily News & Analysis in India demonstrated how biogas produced from manure alone could replace diesel to reap a financial benefit equivalent to £157bn. And that’s before any food or consumer waste is taken into consideration.
India has, in recent times, brought innovation into its biogas sector by exploring new feedstocks such as rotten potatoes, vegetable waste, fruit waste, rotten grains and agricultural waste. However, as with any new development, it is a learning curve and in order to use these feedstocks productively, efficient pre-treatment and advanced on-site digestion processes are being developed and consistently improved.
Biogas in India has a three-tiered, hierarchical approach linking central and state government with the private sector. In industries like distilleries, paper, pulp and starch, many facilities have on-site anaerobic digesters to reduce their load of organic waste. Some sewage treatment plants also have biogas production units, normally equivalent to the power requirements of their wastewater operations.
One of the key attractions of biogas in India is the environmental benefits of avoiding the release of high levels of methane and carbon dioxide into
Cities such as Bangalore are trying to make it mandatory to treat organic waste in a decentralised manner, which has led to several companies
manufacturing containerised AD plants, in a bid to reduce their overall footprint. And municipal corporations are actively looking at the possibility of using anaerobic digestion to divert waste from landfill. Recently, the German Biogas Association, Fachverband Biogas, and the Indian Biogas Association announced a three-year project to foster the development of the biogas industry in India. The initial project, with an option for an additional three years, is funded by the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development and operated by Sequa GmbH. Fachverband Biogas’ Chief Executive Officer, Dr Claudius da Costa Gomez, said that the potential for biogas energy production in the Indian subcontinent is enormous, and we would agree. The global energy crisis and unprecedented levels of climate change through excessive dependence on conventional sources of energy mean that biogas is no longer a choice – it’s a necessity. www.biogas-india.com
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june 2016 | AD & BIOGAS NEWS INTERNATIONAL
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