A personal reflection based on the first year of ISABEL project research in the UK.
by Dr. Andrew Ormerod, UK ISABEL project team (Global Biotechnology Transfer Foundation).
andrew.ormerod@gbtfoundation.org
When we talk about community involvement in a biogas project, we are talking about the level of participation by the community in that particular scheme. This review is based on some general observations from undertaking research for the ISABEL community biogas project and it would be interesting to see if there are similar patterns elsewhere. This is not meant to be a heavy academic review but hopefully will stimulate some interesting thoughts from communities and those interested in community biogas research. It focuses on communities involved in running biogas rather than developing it from a technology standpoint.
I come from an agricultural background and I understand that community participation in agricultural trials – particularly in the developing world runs on a continuous scale. This can be from no involvement where research is only carried out by the private sector or government research – through to farmer lead research where the farmers take the initiative. Somewhere in the middle is government or private research where farmer’s opinions are sought. Further up the scale farmers undertaking research, which is supported by extension workers who liaise with researchers at the research stations.
Similarly may be community biogas can be seen as a continuum from privately run biogas with no community involvement or with a visitor centre and educational outreach at one end of the scale to a ‘hands on’ community lead project at the other end of the scale.
Farmer community biogas
Given the right technical support it may be possible to form a co operative community of farmers to learn how to and then run their own biogas facility.
Biogas run by the people
Communities doing it for themselves
Urban settings can provide fertile ground for the development of community biogas projects. With the involvement of motivational champions concerned about environmental issues and the need for demonstration of issues linked to recycling, energy and food resilience and pollution reduction and like-minded people in the community willing to learn more. Open spaces, temporary spaces, wasteland or parks, gardens and zoos can form foci for micro or small biogas projects. A virtuous circle can be created by using local food waste – as long as it is available – for generating biogas which can be used to support community centers and cafes – at the very least providing energy for cooking. Small mobile biogas equipment can be used local projects that can be moved with relative ease to other sites if needs be. The digestive can be used for community growing schemes – may be encouraging groups into understanding about growing healthy food – in otherwise food desserts. One observation when designing such a project is to identify large enough opportunities to use the digestate* or a large enough land bank to spread it on.
(*Organic matter after anaerobic digestion and methane – biogas production)
Innovative community brought together
In addition biogas along with other form of community energy and sustainable building techniques have been used as a foci to attract in community with different skills – particularly in urban areas with large populations – to get involved in design and construction of community biogas facilities as a means of public participation and building community cohesion.
Education linked to biogas
The production and role Biogas can play in waste – energy and food production has also been used as a way of engaging school and college groups interested in science, technology and engineering subjects. Pupils are involved in understanding how biogas works and simple design of components to be used in small demonstrations of AD facilities. Biogas production can be an additional visitor attraction and educational opportunity for zoos and other public visitor attractions that produce organic waste such as botanic gardens
People trying it for themselves
Workshops have been run in different parts of the world to demonstrate to members of the public and community groups how community biogas works in practice. Although these events are transitory – some have been filmed and have an enduring legacy if posted on line to inspire individuals and groups of people for years to come.
As an adjunct to this small scale biogas equipment for hire or loan can give experience to communities wanting to test the suitability of the equipment for their needs – giving them experience – that if positive can lead on to the community deciding on a more permanent equipment solution for their project.
Over the years there has been interest from a range of UK biogas champions in creating a mosaic of localized biogas facilities – something that the UK ISABEL project is interested in through the development of a platform to exchange views and experience between different communities. This very localized approach dotted around with larger settlements or a range of adjoining villages has proved difficult to achieve up to now because of the lack of availability of food waste. This is due to long term local authority contracts with waste disposal companies. Solutions may include the investigating sources of private food waste from restaurants and food manufacturing, ascertaining availability of local sources of green waste or investigating ways of developing community/on farm biogas facilities combining food waste with livestock slurry.
Community shares
There are various examples of renewable energy schemes that involve the community as shareholders. This may entail an operating company running the facility and profits going into a community chest for local schemes. Shareholders receive a dividend and there is an AGM. In the case of community shares and biogas I have come across just a few examples attempting this model. It may be easier to envisage such a scheme for smaller or micro scale biogas schemes. One alternative for larger schemes is to adopt a hybrid approach of some community shareholding and some private equity.
Biogas run for the people
In some instances perhaps the boundaries may be blurred as to whether biogas production in an institution is run for the people or by the people. In Northern Ireland there was a long running biogas facility in a monastery, which may have straddle the boundaries here. However I understand it doesn’t operate any more as age and time has caught up with those movers and shakers in the monastery who got it started.
Case study – Camphill Community Ballytobin – an example of Community Biogas supporting a community with renable energy from biogas http://www.camphill.ie/ballytobin
“A project be it biogas or whatever can be for, by and of the people depending on how you want to set up its legal structure… a co-op, a whole owned subsidiary of an exiting community entity” – Mark Dwan.
This was established by Mark Dwan at Camphill Community at Ballytobin in the Irish Republic. Camphill communities provide a rural vocational educational facility for people with special needs. They are also present in other countries and different sites have had an ability to evolve to meet their local needs. The site in Ballytobin produces its own vegetables and livestock with the input of the people who come to the college and their assistance. Its building are designed by the people who work there and visiting volunteer helpers from many countries bring with them ideas that influence the site development. When local energy resilience was being considered volunteers from Germany sowed the seed of an idea about the possible development of a biogas facility on site. This lead through a planning and funding process to the development of a small biogas facility on the land adjoining the main Camphill site. The oak cleared from the site was used for building some of the iconic educational buildings on site. Most of the buildings on site are heated with hot water via a district heating system running under the paths. Some outlying buildings too far from the district heating system are heated by a biomass boiler. Ireland isn’t called the Emerald Isle for nothing! It rains a lot and has a moist environment – however the main hall of the building is so dry that it hosts a very fine concert piano – the property of the nearby city of Kilkenny!
Subsequently Combined Heat and Power equipment has been installed which provides some of the electricity for the community.
The biogas facility is run as a separate entity and the amount of energy in whatever form is measured for each of the buildings to allow auditing – I think partly to meet funding requirements. One of the factors, which have affected positively the viability of this plant, is the move away from consigning food waste to landfill in Ireland and payments for food processing certificates have been beneficial.
Engaging with farmers
This facility also benefits from a few local dairy farmers who are very willing to bring along their slurry to be used as feedstock for biogas production. One of the reasons for their interest is that the digestate is available for spreading on the land during the growing season and is almost odourless, produces really good regrowth of. Cattle do not like going out on land spread with fresh slurry – but digestate doesn’t create the same problem allowing cattle to be moved back on the land more quickly after digestate has been applied.
One of the key point Mark Dwan raised was that a biogas plant should have a large enough Land Bank to spread the digestate back on the land to make a project viable. In the UK the digestate has to be produced to a PAS110 standard to allow for digestate to be used on other farmers or producers land.
There may be other challenges to maximizing the use of energy produced here – it isn’t near an electricity grid and one challenge is that unused heat is produced in the summer. So location and demand for electricity from the grid can be a factor as well as availability of tariffs for larger biogas projects. Are there untapped opportunities linked to other enterprises here?
This example may provide inspiration for other institutions and communities where there is interest in providing heat and electricity for activities and enterprises on site.
Biogas for local communities
There is inspiration from visiting an Energy Villages in Germany and understanding a little more about co-housing and sustainable housing projects developed or planned in the UK; where sources of renewable energy are linked to local houses using district heating systems and private wires. Biogas could be an element of these developments – particularly if there is land enough and horticultural activities on hand to use the digestate. One of the challenges is for developers with vision and a clear interest in integrated sustainable development to come to the fore. There may be opportunities in the UK with a new wave of garden cities being planned.
One challenge here is how to deal with the dynamic of the community that isn’t there – yet. If there is a need for community engagement and cohesion – how is that mind set encouraged in a community in the process of being established?
Thinking about community involvement
Very simply as catalysts once interested communities have been identified. It is important to establish personal contact and understand the dynamics of the local communities and to find out from the local community who are the movers and shakers. Who are the solid reliable members of the community and get things done? Are there ways of encouraging continued interest through the different generations of the community? One experienced community energy expert suggested it was useful for representatives of the community to have project and financial management as well as community engagement skills among their mix.
It is useful to have a good mix of creative and pragmatic input from members of the local community and to ensure that interest endures beyond the length of the current project. Also as well as exuberant opinion – it is useful to gauge the thoughts of quieter members of the community. Taking an agricultural example then it is useful to encourage the establishment of a local committee in the community you are working with. Examples in South America have a committee of four, the chairman, secretary, researcher and someone involved in community engagement – and events in the community one might add!
The challenge of keeping community interest going
With share owned community energy projects initial observations suggest that in some cases it may be more difficult to get the local community involved in the steering group. I also think this is a challenge with biogas and other forms of renewables when the initial movers and shakers move on. Certainly local involvement a feeling of community ownership and say so and a return to the community may well help with the level of interest and acceptability of a new energy scheme which otherwise may be rejected. Somehow new talent needs to be there in the wings. Someone once said to me that it is a good idea to have a mixture of ages in a committee linked to community activities to ensure continuity. Otherwise a whole group of people who started a project may step back from it at the same time. So there is a need to keep the level of interest going after any initial flurry of activity surrounding a new project. There is also a need to ensure that any community members involved in a project have resilience as planning a renewable energy project can take time. Perhaps mixing in other related projects that produce short-term returns and successful outcomes from shorter-term goals is a good idea.
Can the wheel be re-invented?
One challenge of mature projects – is that young activists may come up with many ideas to help their community. Over the years as these may be whittled down by practicality, funding constraints, public opinion and red tape – creating a sense of mature wisdom. Sometimes the next generation comes along uninhibited by the experience of life lived asking the same questions – without realising the difficulties encountered. These challenges often endure (humanity doesn’t change that quickly!) but in some cases circumstances can change finally making the original concepts feasible.
This is the result of careful thought and reflection from the UK ISABEL teams experience over the initial phase of the project. We welcome thoughts and observations linked to the way community’s function in relation to community energy and community energy projects from people in the UK and in other parts of Europe. It would be interesting to see if cultural differences and practices affect community cohesion in relation to community energy and biogas projects in different parts of Europe. We know from past work that there are differences in economic, infrastructure and social involvement between the biogas projects in the developed and the developing world (1).
For communities in the UK up and running or in the planning interested in the exploring the most appropriate models to suit them please feel free to contact the UK ISABEL project team.
Reference
(1) Kealan Gell, Review of Small Scale, Community Biogas in the Industrialized World