Biomethane
be based only on growth in deployment. Further degressions will make the government’s ambition of supporting 20 biomethane and 95 biogas heat plants commissioning per year by 2021 hard to deliver.”
Heating Britain’s homes Until recently, the gas grid has not really figured in government plans to decarbonise the heat sector but this area is now finding itself under the spotlight. The think tank Policy Exchange produced a report on the subject entitled ‘Too Hot to Handle’, and Richard Howard, its Head of Energy and Environment, thinks green gas could have a major part to play: “Before addressing the question of how to decarbonise heating in homes, it’s worth taking a moment to ask how big a challenge that is. The UK currently spends £32bn a year on heat, which accounts for 48 per cent of total energy use and one third of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions – 23m homes currently have gas heating.”
In 2012/13, DECC concluded that the best long term option for urban areas would be heat networks, with heat pumps in rural areas and gas as a transitional solution in suburban areas. “Fundamentally, this roadmap suggested for 2050 a mix for heating of 85 per cent heat pumps, 10 per cent heat networks and less than five per cent gas,” says Richard. However, converting 80 per cent of homes to heat pumps could cost in the region of £300bn. At the same time, peak winter heat demand exceeds 300 GW, a swing that the electricity grid could not cope with without massive extra capacity. “This is how people use heat and want to use heat,” continues Richard. “You might be able to shift demand a little, but you are not going to be able to reduce that seasonal peak by much. Gas could play an important role – but it’s not low carbon. The good thing about green gas (such as biomethane) is that you are changing something outside the home. People can continue to use their boiler, but with a greener form of gas. That is essentially easy for people in the way that switching to electric heat pumps is not. It doesn’t fundamentally change their interaction with their energy or heating. The argument that we ought to scrap the gas grid in decarbonising heat should be challenged.”
Overcoming technical and financial barriers But getting green gas into the grid in the first place is not without its difficulties. One of the barriers to biomethane injection has been the often costly technical standards which must be met. However, a new project by National Grid could help to overcome this. National Grid has secured £4.8m of Ofgem funding for its Project CLoCC (Customer Low Cost Connections)
Policy Exchange’s Richard Howard believes we should challenge the notion that the gas grid cannot help to decarbonise heat
National Grid’s Project CLoCC aims to ensure a variety of connection options are available for its changing customer base
venture, which will see the company and its partners design and build an innovative gas connection solution for the National Transmission System (NTS). It is primarily aimed at smaller and unconventional gas customers for whom connecting to the NTS under the current arrangements can be extremely challenging, and aims to ensure that a variety of connection options are available for its changing customer base.
“Project CLoCC strives to reduce both the time and cost of connecting onto the NTS, for new and existing customers, by fundamentally challenging every aspect of the current connection process,” explains Nicola Riggon, Communications Support for Project CLoCC at the National Grid. “This critical innovation work will support the development of future indigenous gas sources, such as biomethane, whilst also supporting the development of exit projects, such as for Compressed Natural Gas (CNG). Given the higher flow levels on the NTS, Project CLoCC is investigating whether there would be a requirement for biomethane producers to add propane when injecting into the NTS,” she adds. “Additionally, there would be no obligation to add odorant when injecting into the NTS, so this would provide an extra cost saving to a biomethane producer.”
Ofgem funding is also being used for a three-year pilot study to update the way gas bills are calculated, to take into account more of the lower carbon alternatives to natural gas likely to be powering homes and businesses in the future. The pilot will look at how customers can be billed using the calorific value of the gas they actually receive, rather than using an average. This should remove the need for alternative, low carbon gas producers to add costly propane to their gas to bring it up to an average calorific value. The study will look at a number of methods for achieving this, including using smart meters to record the calorific value of gas being used by homes and businesses.
Building capacity All of this will come as welcome news to biomethane plant developers, whose numbers are continuing to grow. New plants are being commissioned right across the UK, including the Amur facility in South Milford. Once commissioning is completed and the 500 kWe food waste plant enters commercial operation, at full capacity it will provide 800m3
of gas to the
grid, as well as 1,200 kW of thermal power via a CHP engine and boiler.
Continued>>
www.adbioresources.org adbioresources.org SPRING 2017 | AD & BIORESOURCES NEWS 9
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