Building an agricultural anaerobic digestion plant

Agricultural anaerobic digestion to help reducing our dependence on fossil natural gas and to provide additional income for farmers

On behalf of the company Méthacollines, Artelia managed the installation of an agricultural anaerobic digestion plant able to process 10,500 tonnes per year of organic matter (manure, slurry, dedicated crops, food industry waste) using an infinitely mixed digestion process under anaerobic conditions. It includes all the storage and purification facilities needed to inject the gas into the network.

10.5 t/year

of recycled organic matter

250 to 500,000 Nm3/year

of biomethane production

400 to 650 k€/year

resale of biomethane injected into the network for the operator

CONTEXT & ISSUES

Recovering energy from vegetal and animal waste by anaerobic digestion is one of the ways currently being encouraged to limit the extraction and use of fossil natural gas. In addition, once the plant has paid for itself, it provides farmers with an additional income support. This type of installation can also be fed by dedicated crops (CIVE) and by waste from the agri-food industry. The digestate obtained during the anaerobic digestion process can be used as a fertiliser.

Artelia advises and supports numerous farmers and farming associations in implementing these anaerobic digestion processes. For Méthacollines, our teams managed the construction of a complete anaerobic digestion plant with its various tanks (maturation, anaerobic digestion), its biogas purification plant (140 Nm3/h), its injection station into the gas network and its material and digestate reception and storage platforms. These facilities, designed to process manure, slurry and CIVE, can process 10,500 t of organic matter per year for an annual biomethane production capacity of around 250 to 500 000 Nm3/year, likely to generate €400-650k/year in resales of biomethane injected into the network.