Research News
Biogas Plant on a Farm in Niederbrechen, Hessen. Photo: Volker Thies
Listen to Dr. Daniela Thrän talk about this in the current Helmholtz Podcast:
Listen to Dr. Daniela Thrän talk about this in the current Helmholtz Podcast:
Using biomass more efficiently
More than two thirds of renewable energy in Germany is produced using biomass. Logs are utilised as is corn stover, rapeseed oil and other plant products. Yet although bioenergy can replace fossil fuels to a certain extent, it is not automatically ecological. This is because the cultivation of energy plants uses large areas which in turn has ecological consequences, particularly if the energy plants are still fertilised. Scientists at the Bioenergy Department at the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ) are studying how bioenergy can be used ecologically, efficiently and sustainably to supply energy.
Bioenergy has a great deal of potential but it depends on how it is produced and used, explains Dr Daniela Thrän, spokesperson of the Bioenergy Department at UFZ. Important, for example, is which energy source is replaced with bioenergy: As such, a large percentage of power is still produced in coal-fired power plants today which releases a particularly large amount of green house gas per kilowatt hour. Power can also be produced with gas from biogas plants. In this process, certain bacteria cultures produce primarily methane from biomass. Methane is very similar to natural gas and can be used efficiently to produce power. Yet even better use could be made of biomass since, to date, the woody portion of the plants is left over. The scientists at the Bioenergy Department are therefore studying these microorganisms in order to come up with approaches to optimising their use. The aim is to develop microorganisms which produce a large amount of biogas in a short period and which are still able to utilise the fibroid materials.
To this end, the researchers are focusing on targeted cultivation and adaptation of new strains of bacteria. Using new microorganisms and through further technical innovations, it might already be possible in a few years for biogas plants which are only half the size of current plants yet which produce four times the amount of biogas per time unit to be commissioned. In a few years, bioenergy could not only generate power considerably more efficiently than before but could also replace a larger percentage of fossil fuels. In this regard, Daniela Thrän is not only thinking of rapeseed the yield of which per area is limited but also about innovative processes which are currently being developed and, for example, could produce liquid fuels from vegetable waste or energy grass. The scientists at the Bioenergy Department are not only working on increasing the energy yield from use of biomass but also studying the ecological and social effects which the cultivation of energy plants brings with it. This is because the role that bioenergy will play in the future will also depend on the extent to which it is possible to bring energy efficiency, ecology and food production into harmony.
