A budding agri-energy sector using manure and farm-based organic material to generate electricity is ready to take off in Eastern Ontario, but provincial energy regulators are holding it back.
That was the consensus at a day-long conference on June 14 in Cumberland according to Cobden dairy farmer Paul Klaesi, the president the AgriEnergy Producers’ Association of Eastern Ontario (APAEO). The launch of the new agri-energy group was attended by more than 80 farmers, industry representatives, government officials, and financial institutions. About a quarter of those in attendance were interested farmers, an encouraging turn-out, Klaesi said, considering that June is an extremely busy time for producers. Some came from as far away as southern Ontario to hear about the production of energy from biogas on livestock operations.
Biogas is a 60-40 mix of methane and carbon dioxide that is produced when microbes break down organic matter, such as manure. The methane can then be captured and burned in natural gas generators to produce energy to power farm operations. Extra energy can be sold to the Ontario power grid as an additional revenue stream for the farm operator.
Klaesi and his brother Paul recently won widespread acclaim and a $50K innovation prize for their biogas system that turns the manure produced by their 280 cattle into enough heat and electricity to run their farm-with some left over to sell to Hydro One. The brothers’ hydro bill has dropped from about $2500 per month to $30.
Klaesi told The AgriNews the APAEO is not just a group of people interested in learning about biogas production.
"Membership is restricted to farmers who are in the process of planning or actually building a digester," he said. "We welcome inquiries from interested farmers and are happy to provide information, but the association is strictly an agri-energy producers’ group." He said three energy sector firms that design and construct the biogas facilities have applied for associate member status.
Key to biogas production is the construction of an anaerobic digestion (AD) system. Manure and other organic waste is dumped into a large, airtight concrete tank, often with a rubber membrane stretched over the top, where it is heated to 40 degrees Celsius and continually agitated for 28 days. (Forty degrees duplicates the conditions in a cow’s stomach.) Microbes break down the organic matter to produce biogas and a residual product that is a high-nutrient fertilizer virtually free of pathogens such as E.coli.
The science of biogas production has become very precise. The power value of a single cow has been calculated to be 2kWh of electricity per day, and in cash crop operations, one acre of corn produces some 6,500 kWh of electricity per year.
While the AD system may be novel to the Ontario farm scene, digesters have been in wide, large-scale use in Europe for many years and are making up an increasing proportion of power production there. The Klaesi brothers are using methods they brought from their native Switzerland two decades ago.
One industry representative at the June conference was Benjamin Strehler, Vice President of the Ottawa-based company Genesys Biogas, which designed and constructed the Klaesis’ Cobden operation. Strehler said he was overwhelmed by the turnout at the conference.
"With this level of interest, I’m sure the APAEO will be taken as a serious player in the development of the small-scale energy sector emerging in Ontario," he said. "Along with the association, we expect to be consulted as government regulators move forward to include the farm sector in Ontario’s energy strategy."
Last month APAEO Administrator Graeme Millen told The AgriNews that provincial regulatory guidelines for AD operations are either out-of-date or non-existent.
"There are all these people (in government and its agencies) saying they want to go ahead and do these things, but the people who can make the changes aren’t willing to because they’re afraid to bear the brunt in case anything goes wrong," Millen said. "Everything being proposed is proven technology, but no one’s willing to support these small-scale projects."
That may be changing.
OMAFRA economic development client account officer Yves Lavictoire said the conference and association launch was a huge step forward for the industry.
He noted that the APAEO has already achieved an important success by convincing Hydro One to accept a type of transfer trip-a device used to ensure electricity coming on to the public grid is properly controlled-that costs $10,000 instead of the $200,000 model Hydro One originally required. That cost reduction alone, he said, will make biogas production much more economically viable.
"Biogas energy production is new to all the government players, so people need to be educated about how all the pieces fit together," a role he says the APAEO is quickly taking on.
The APAEO serves producers in the Renfrew County, the City of Ottawa and its surrounding rural area, the United Counties of Prescott-Russell and the United Counties of Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry.
Information on APAEO, biogas production and AD technology can be found on the association’s website www.apaeo.com.
News
July, 2007
Vol. 31, No. 7
NEWS
