Biogás En Italia

Workshop :Biogas – a promising renewable energy source for Europe December 11, 2008 - European Parliament, Brussels, Belgium

STATE OF THE ART OF BIOGAS IN ITALY
SERGIO PICCININI Research Centre on Animal Production - CRPA Reggio Emilia, Italy s.piccinini@crpa.it - www.crpa.it SUMMARY CRPA has carried out a survey of all operational anaerobic digestion plants in Italy in the livestock andagro-industrial sector in order to create an archive capable of providing a complete picture of the dimensions of the sector in Italy and of the main plant characteristics. In October 2007, 185 examples of biogas plant were identified working with livestock effluent, energy crops, organic residues, waste from the agro-industrial sector and the organic fraction of urban refuse. This figure includesthose plants still awaiting authorisation and those still under construction. The majority of the plants surveyed, that is 154, operate with livestock effluent, agricultural waste agro-industrial residues and energy crops. There are now 115 examples of active plants using livestock effluent. This represents an increase of about 43 units since the last survey of 1999 (+60%). It is an increase of 78units (+108%) if those still under construction are also considered. This confirms the strong expansion of the anaerobic digestion sector in Italy. 1. INTRODUCTION In Europe the development of anaerobic digestion began in the sector of civil sewage treatment plants for the stabilisation of sludge and currently it is estimated that there are more than 1600 operational digesters. As things stand atthe moment this technique is considered to be one of the best for the treatment of the wastewater from agro-industrial complexes with high organic content. As early as 1994 there were about 400 business and consortium biogas units while now there are more than 3500 anaerobic digesters operating on livestock effluent in all countries of the European Union. The highest number is in Germany followed byDenmark, Austria, Sweden and Italy. There are currently about 450 active plants for the recovery of biogas from MSW landfills with a high concentration in Great Britain. This type of treatment is being increasingly supplemented in recent years by the treatment of the organic fraction deriving from the differentiated collection of municipal waste (biowaste), digested with other organic industrialwaste and livestock slurries. In Denmark alone there are now 21 centralised co-digestion plants of this type, treating about 1,750,000 tons of livestock slurry and 450,000 tons of organic industrial waste and biowaste. According to a recent survey there are now about 170 anaerobic digestion units treating the organic fraction of urban refuse coming both from differential collection and frommechanical sorting following collection and/or organic industrial waste. It is estimated that for 2007 the production of biogas by European countries was about 5,901.2 ktoe (ktoe = Kiloton of oil equivalent). Of this figure about 50% came from the recovery of bio-gas from urban waste tips (EurObserv’ER 2008). EurObserv’ER forecasts biogas production in 2010 will amount to 7,800 ktoe. Organic refuseproduced yearly by European Union countries amounts to about 2.5 billion tons of which about 40% is livestock effluent and agricultural waste, the remainder made up by urban and industrial waste, sewage sludges and wood-cellulose waste from forestry, the only part that could not be used in anaerobic digestion (source IEA Bioenergy task 37, www.iea-biogas.net). The country where anaerobic digestion hasbeen developed the most over the last ten years is Germany, particularly in the livestock sector.

CRPA –Reggio Emilia, Italy

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Workshop :Biogas – a promising renewable energy source for Europe December 11, 2008 - European Parliament, Brussels, Belgium

This is the result of the policy of incentives adopted by the national government which, in addition to providing a contribution...