The resource of biomethane, produced via biological, thermal and electrical routes, as a transport biofuel

Jerry D. Murphy, James Browne, Eoin Allen and Cathal Gallagher

Renewable Energy, 2013, vol. 55, issue C, 474-479

Abstract: Biomethane is an energy vector suitable for renewable transport fuel which may derive energy through three different methodologies: thermal gasification; biological anaerobic digestion; and conversion of electricity to hydrogen (via electrolysis) and on to methane as described by the Sabatier Equation. Thermal gasification to produce methane (based on “hard” feed stock) tends to require significant scale, of the order of 400 MW. Biological anaerobic digestion (based on “soft” feed stock) is typically of scale less than 1 MW. Systems based on the Sabatier Equation convert hydrogen to methane exothermically and sequester carbon. The resource is assessed at 19% of energy in transport in Ireland. Adopting the approach of the EU Renewable Energy Directive (for example double credit for biofuels from residues and lignocellulosic feed stock) biomethane can supply 40% renewable energy supply in transport (RES-T). The resource is sufficient to supply 30% of the private transport fleet with indigenous sustainable gaseous biofuel.

Keywords: Biomethane; Sabatier Equation; Gasification; Biofuel (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960148113000372
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:renene:v:55:y:2013:i:c:p:474-479

DOI: 10.1016/j.renene.2013.01.012

Access Statistics for this article

Renewable Energy is currently edited by Soteris A. Kalogirou and Paul Christodoulides

More articles in Renewable Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().