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John Baldwin

Managing Director, CNG Services Ltd

C Eng M I Mech E, M I Gas E, MA (Oxon)

John.baldwin@cngservices.co.uk

www.cngservices.co.uk

0121 707 8581, 07831 241217

4 June 09

Biomethane bus potential in UK and Europe

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Agenda

• CNG Services Ltd• Aims for the presentation

– What is biomethane and how is it made?– Biomethane injection into the gas grid (BtG)– Biomethane buses in Europe– Bus opportunities in UK– Conclusions

Vehicle use and Biomethane to Grid go together

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CNG Services Ltd

• Supporting efficient utilisation of biomethane including:– Cleaning bio-gas and injecting biomethane into the gas grid

• Creator of the UU Davyhulme BtG and CBM Project

– Supporting introduction of biomethane fuelled vehicles in the UK

• VW Caddy Ecofuel• MB Sprinter NGT

We are independent from all makers of vehicles, clean-up, compression etc. Our aim is to support biogas producers in exploiting the biomethane to grid

and biomethane as vehicle fuel opportunities

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What is biomethane?

• Bio-gas contains typically 65% methane, 35% CO2– Lager shandy

• Natural gas contains around 90% methane, with ethane, propane, butane, CO2 and nitrogen making up the rest

– Blended whisky– Made from dinosaur poo in a prehistoric AD, contaminated over the millenia– Mercury, radioactivity, hundreds of chemicals, yucky

• Biomethane is bio-gas without the CO2, containing around 98% methane

– Malt whisky, the elixir of life

Biogas/BioSNG Production

By Anaerobic Digestion or Gasification

Distribution

The gas grid and vehicles love biomethane because of its purity

Organic Resources

Including food waste, agriculture waste & sewage

Clean up to Biomethane

To meet gas quality

standards

Gas network to >80% of UK

homes

Buses

Buses can run on biomethane

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DEFRA vision for AD

This is very good news for the environment and for the UK economy

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Biomethane to Grid (BtG)

Widespread consensus that gas grid injection is attractive because of absence of uses for waste heat where renewable methane is made. Take the gas to the customers along existing pipelines and have high efficiency utilisation….no need to move biomass by road…or use the biomethane to fuel buses on it

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UK Energy Act 2008• At present, biogas is rewarded when used to make electricity and

when used as a vehicle fuel• But it is not rewarded when used as a form of renewable heat• However, good news is that the Energy Act 2008 Supports

Biomethane to Grid• Consultation to follow in Q2 2009• Financial premium for gas injected to the gas grid likely to be in the

range 120 – 200 p/therm – The smaller number is broadly equivalent to double ROCs for a large AD– The larger number reflects benefit greater level of fossil fuel replacement – Premium needs to incentivise the right market behaviour as we cannot afford to

pour malt whisky down the drain….

• Premium will be paid from April 2011

We are asking DECC to signal the level of tariff and mechanism so we can divert PFI organic waste from local electricity generation to BtG and get double the renewable benefit….avoiding a 25 year regret

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Use of renewable methane

Generate electricity, some use for Waste heat

Energy used – displacing fossilfuel

Energy wasted – no displacing of Fossil fuel

Run vehicles in dual fuel diesel-biomethane engine

Inject to gas grid, displace fossil methane in heating

45% 55%

100%100% as energy used to make diesel is greater than energy to make compressed biomethane

Around 55% of the energy in the renewable methane is wasted

100%100% as energy used to make biomethane is similar to energy used to transport gas to UK by pipeline

Given the need to displace 15% of fossil fuels by renewable fuels by 2020, the transport and heating uses for biomethane are around 2 x better than the electricity use (even with some local heat use)

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Biomethane as Vehicle Fuel

• Renewable Transport Fuel Certificates• EU Renewable Energy Directive – double the benefit if the

transport fuel is made from waste….• Local air quality benefits, NOX, particulates• Significantly reduced noise• Reform of the BSOG

– Encouragement to biomethane buses

The Govt needs revenue – but taxing biomethane used to fuel buses is not the main target area!

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What about biomethane as a vehicle fuel?

How is it made?

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Making biomethane

Lots of ways of cleaning up raw biogas to make

Biomethane with the technology shown as

a ‘black box’

This shows biomethane going into the gas grid, with addition of propane(to increase the calorific value) andodorant (to give a smell)

Gas Grid

FromAnaerobicDigester

Or can go direct to CNG compressor andvehicles from here

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Compressed biomethane vehicle fuelL

oca

l Gas

Gri

d P

ipe

CNG Compressors

Storage Cascade

Dispenser

Biogas supply from Anaerobic

Digester

Propane and odorant then

gas grid injection

Biogas Clean-up plant

Back-up supply from

gas grid

0.01 bar7 bar

250 barTypically 1 bar

Vehicle use and Biomethane to Grid go together

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How does biomethane compare with other bio-fuels in its ability to convert sunlight falling on a

hectare of land into a useful vehicle fuel ?

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Efficiency of Alternative Fuels –How many km will a car run with the fuel produced on 1 ha?

18.500

13.300

19.300

33.200

57.000

71.200

0 10.000 20.000 30.000 40.000 50.000 60.000 70.000 80.000

Bio Diesel

BTL (FT Diesel from forest biomass)

Bio-Ethanol from wheat

Bio-Ethanol from corn

Bio-Ethanol from sugar beet

Biogas from corn silage via gas grid

km/ha.a

• Biomethane offers carbon neutral transport option:

– Lowest ‘Well to Wheel’ CO2 of any fuel

– It’s all about ability to convert a hectare of sunlight into fuel – renewable methane wins

Biomethane is the best fuel in terms of CO2

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We have the waste, we can make the fuel, what about

the buses?

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EU Buses - New

Most major bus manufacturers make CNG buses (though not yet in the UK)

What new buses are available in the EU that can run on compressed

biomethane?

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IrisBus Citelis 12 CNG Bus

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• Length: 12 m

• Passengers capacity: 46 seats and 61 standees

• Fuel consumption: very good

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Evobus Citaro CNG Bus

• Length: 12 m• Passengers capacity: 29 seats and 67-96 standees• Fuel consumption: good

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Neoman Lion’s City CNG Bus

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• Length: 12 m

• Passengers capacity: 36 – 44 seats and standees depending from local regulations

• Fuel consumption: fair

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Van Hool NEW A 330 CNG Bus

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• Length: 12 m

• Passengers capacity: up to 29 seats and 66 standees.

• Fuel consumption: high

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Volvo V7000 CNG Buses

• Length: 12 m (standard), 18 m (articulated buses)

• Passengers capacity:• standard bus: 28-31 seats and 70-80 standees

• articulated bus: 38 seats and 105 standees

• Fuel consumption: high

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EU Buses – Modified Buses

Dual fuel may be the winning choice for conversions

• For existing bus fleets, there are 3 options to modify the bus to make it run on compressed biomethane:

– Install new engine (eg CNG engines made by Cummins Westport)

– Convert to dual fuel (diesel/biomethane)

• Swedish project

– Convert the diesel engine into a spark ignition engine

• India - Delhi

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EU Buses – Dual Fuel

Most major bus manufacturers make CNG buses

• Convert to dual fuel (diesel/biomethane)

– Swedish project

• Highest efficiency so best use of biomethane in terms of fossil replacement

• 1 million kg would do 50% of fuel of 100 buses or 100% of fuel of 40 buses

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EU Buses – Success Stories

To many to mention, my mother likes the Lille one…

• Lille - biomethane

• Stockholm - biomethane

• Paris

• Madrid

• Rome

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Lille Video (1)

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Lille Video (2)

Weed the garden

You won’t hear them (50% less noise than diesel)You won’t smell them (close to zero NOX and particulates)

Make bio-methane,Fill the busesDon’t eat the celery

But you’ll be delighted to ride on themLooks too good to

be true – carbon neutral bus travel, with very low Nox and particulates

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Lille

• My mother, aged 77, is not a transport

specialist, nor an energy specialist, nor a vehicle manufacturer– However, she does recycle and she does turn off the standby button

• She watched the Lille video:– 226 buses running on biomethane from domestic waste– Refuse lorries on biomethane being introduced– Very high recycling rates, consumer has direct link between cabbage leaf and road

fuel

• She says “it’s obvious that every town in Britain should do that” and “we should stop messing around and do it?”

– Vehicles available, no technical challenges– All it needs is a holistic approach between waste disposal and transport and we can

have truly carbon neutral buses and refuse trucks

• How are we doing? Will Mrs Baldwin be impressed at our performance in introducing low carbon buses into the UK

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UK Buses

• No……• 100% of UK buses run on diesel• Not one natural gas bus operating in UK• London 2012 – what fuel?

– Hydrogen?– Electric?– Diesel with/without hybrid?– Natural gas with/without hybrid?– Biomethane with/without hybrid

• Olympic buses are usually CNG – very clean, quiet, low CO2

• We could stay with diesel but paint them green?

Compressed Biomethane buses are a very good idea, why not? Each town will have at least one AD plant, why not put one bus route on biomethane?

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Conclusions• We have the gas grid and the full support of UK gas distribution

network owners and energy suppliers

• We have the organic resources and the political vision to develop anaerobic digesters

• We have a landfill problem and the need to recycle waste

• Biomethane injection into gas grid is widespread in Europe, no material technical issues (its just processing gas on a small scale)

• We have vehicles made by OEMs such as VW, Iveco and MB

• We have a bus industry that could make buses

• We are starting to reform BSOG

• Put all this together and we can create a thriving domestic biomethane fuelled bus industry that is able to make a very material contribution towards the UK’s 2020 targets

There are no material technical issues or barriers, we just need the BtG premium to be set as soon as possible so that we can get on with it and start

producing biomethane that can go into the gas grid and into buses