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Surplus wind stored as gas

By: Tom Russell 22/01/2016 DTU

General Windfarms

A recent research project has shown that wind energy can be converted into methane gas and stored in the Danish natural gas grid. As an added bonus, the biogas plants eliminate their carbon emissions using a new tested method.

The MeGA-StoRE project (Methane Gas Storage for Renewable Energy) carried out by the Technical University of Denmark (DTU), in collaboration with Lemvig Biogas Plant, has tested a new method that involves using the biogas plant to convert wind energy into methane gas, which can subsequently be transferred to the natural gas grid.

Photo: Lemvig Biogasanlæg

“First and foremost, Megastore is an electricity storage project,” says Lars Albæk Kristensen, Director at Lemvig Biogas Plant.

The first step in the process is to convert the surplus wind turbine electricity into hydrogen using electrocatalysis. In the next step, hydrogen is allowed to react with CO₂ in a reactor at the biogas plant to produce methane gas and water. Biogas namely consists of methane and CO₂. The CO₂ content of the biogas is removed at the plant in order to produce the pure methane, which can then be added to the natural gas supply.

The plant is the ideal site to collect CO₂ as is produced as a waste product. CO₂ although present in large quantities in the atmosphere, CO₂ is difficult to collect.

"Biogas contains 35 per cent CO₂ of an extremely high purity. And if we can store the surplus wind power energy in a carbon source such as methane, it'll be just like with oil: 100 per cent of what we put into the pipe, comes out the other end.”

Instead of the typical method where biogas is cleansed of CO₂ and the methane then transferred to the natural gas grid, the Lemvig Biogas Plant project carried out a test to assess viability of the idea. DTU stated that in capturing the CO2, allowing it to react with hydrogen, not only did this utilise all the carbon in the biogas, it also increased methane production by approximately 50 per cent. The test facility at Lemvig Biogas Plant produced 24 m3 of biogas over a 24-hour period.

So if we use the hydrogen (which is made from surplus wind turbine electricity, ed.) to convert CO₂ into methane, we will have a carbon-based energy storage facility. And very close to 100 per cent of the CO₂ is converted into chemically pure methane. We already have access to the infrastructure in the natural gas grid where we can store the energy. That’s the brilliance of the idea,” says Lars Albæk Kristensen.

DTU explained that the project must now be scaled up and will continue in the years ahead in a project at NGF Nature Energy on Funen, where the goal is to render the process even cleaner and more profitable.

"Wind energy has already come a long way in Denmark. We’ve made the world sit up and take note—we’re the ones who came up with the solution. The next goal is to store the electricity so that in the future we don’t just sell wind turbines, but the complete system," said Professor Per Møller from DTU Mechanical Engineering, who is behind the Megastore project:

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Surplus wind stored as gas

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