Germany's Weltec to build 1-MW biogas plant in Australia

German firm Weltec Biopower GmbH is building a 1-MW anaerobic digestion biogas plant in a suburb of Melbourne, Australia together with project partner Aquatec Maxcon.

Construction on the facility, which will be one of the first of its kind in Australia, started in October and will take 14 months, Weltec said today.

The plant is being built for water supply and sewerage services company Yarra Valley Water, which will become energy self-sufficient at the project location in Aurora. Any unused surplus of electricity produced by the two 530-kW MAN engines will be fed into the grid.

The facility's two stainless-steel digesters will use 100 tonnes of organic waste a day, more than 50% of which will come from cafeterias and restaurants. The rest will be fats and oils, brewery and dairy leftovers, fruit and vegetable waste and sludge pumped from the adjacent wastewater treatment plant.

Given the debate currently underway in Australia about the future energy mix and nature conservation, the country is expected to see more investment in anaerobic digestion projects, said the German company, which boasts a presence on five continents with about 300 biogas plants.

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