[Digestion] Thermophilic in Canada - Ontario status

[Terrence Sauvé]

Hi Frank and all.

For small scale commercial, there is two digester connected to the grid making money that I know of that would be in your scale size (cement tank, HDPE dome to collect biogas). The manufacturer is Genesys - Keller Engineering in Ottawa, ON.
One system is at Cobden the other is in St-Eugene, both in Ontario.

For the high temp question, there is a small scale system, ~60 cubic meter, in the Thunder Bay area by EEC, but the system is on and off all the time, not really working 24/7 since they have no manure to use because the farmer has switched type of operation (from milking cows to cattle feedlot). It is thermophillic, versus the two systems of Genesys that are mesophilic (much easier to operate for farmers). They have tested multiple feedstocks but not for a long period.

For the substrate, the two systems of Genesys are using food waste from various sources. They are or have signed contracts for supply of the waste.
As of the urban dweller, obviously  natural gas or propane is still cheap. I have tried a batch reactor outside in a 50 gallons drum to produce inoculum for my other tests here. 

There must be some people looking into it, but the cost of using or modifying a concrete septic tank is quite expensive, specially when the municipal inspector comes along... Not the type of attention you want. And if you want to use it outside, its pretty cold in here, so it would only really work for a few months, unless you plan on having a huge tank in your backyard relying on psychrophillic temperature range.

There is also a few other biogas systems in Ontario, but only a few is selling electricity under the Standard Offer Program (name will change soon to Renewable Energy Standard Offer Program RESOP) and the rest are under net-metering.
There is also a lot of nice presentations at a conference in London, ON about biogas and the such. The slides of last year can be downloaded at : www.gtmconf.ca
This year's slides will be posted up soon I imagine. They mainly focus on grid connection issues (anti-islanding and over capacity of the feeder lines) and the slow process, but improving, of a connection impact assessment (CIA) by Hydro-Ontario.

Have a good day.


______________________________________
Terrence Sauvé, B.Eng Bioresource
Research Assistant
Alfred Campus - University of Guelph
31 St. Paul Street, P.O. Box 580
Alfred, Ontario, K0B 1A0, CANADA
Tel.: 613-679-2218 x602
Fax: 613-679-2420
E-mail: tsauve at alfredc.uoguelph.ca