OUR SERVICES
What we do
ENERGY
BioGas
Stream BioEnergy develops and operates biogas projects that use anaerobic digestion technology to produce biogas, which can be used in a number of ways.
Anaerobic digestion is a sustainable form of renewable energy production through a naturally-occurring biological process in which micro-organisms break down biodegradable material in the absence of oxygen in an enclosed system. The process produces a methane-rich biogas and a nutrient rich fertiliser known as ‘digestate’.
In this way biogas plants can offer industrial food and beverage producers a sustainable outlet for the management of their waste in an environmentally friendly way, thereby helping to decarbonise the agri-food sector at a time when food production is increasing to meet rising demand.
The biogas can be converted into renewable electricity, or it can be upgraded to biomethane for use as a vehicle fuel or for injection directly into the gas network to provide a source of renewable heat. Biogas is an important part of the transition to sustainable energy production and use.
Feedstocks for biogas production include domestic and commercial food waste, industrial organics from the food and beverage processing industry, sewage sludge from municipal wastewater treatment plants, garden waste, and organic residues and animal manures/slurries from the agricultural sector.
Benefits
Anaerobic digestion is a proven and efficient technology that delivers multiple energy, climate, environmental, social and economic benefits.
Methane is a significant contributor to climate change. More than half of global methane emissions are attributable to human activities in waste and agriculture. In particular, Ireland is one of the highest per capita producers of climate-changing greenhouse gases in Europe, in part because of its methane-producing livestock and dairy farms.
As well as removing these greenhouse gases from the atmosphere and providing a sustainable source of energy to replace fossil fuels, anaerobic digestion reduces the amounts of waste being sent to landfill or spread on the land, thereby helping achieve waste recycling targets.
Digestate provides farmers with a valuable source of organic fertiliser that replaces artificial fertilisers and provides increased biosecurity by avoiding land spreading of untreated manures. The spreading of these manures on the land is having serious environmental effects in terms of too many nutrients entering the ecosystem, which in turn leads to algae blooms and toxins that are harmful to both humans and aquatic life.
Anaerobic digestion provides another income stream, and better control of energy costs for farmers as well as the creation of jobs in the rural economy. It also provides for sustainable smart agriculture with circular economy benefits including the recycling of nutrients to land in a way that safeguards the environment.
Circular Economy Benefits
An anaerobic digestion plant is the hub of a circular economy where value is created from what would otherwise be waste material – or even a contaminant. Agricultural and food wastes are collected, processed, and turned into useable commodities (in the form of gas, heat and digestate), which can then be reused in the agri-food industry and wider economy.
