CEREM –the project–

The Complejo de Energía Renovable, México (CEREM), translated to ‘Renewable Energy Complex, Mexico’ is a proposed energy partnership for a methane electrical power plant model. Using urban wastes for feedstock, the project will fuel a Stirling engine generator with renewable methane and provide operator and technician training. As part of the new integrated waste management process of Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco, Mexico, CEREM will use post-consumer market waste and city-collected green waste feedstock in an innovative system of anaerobic digesters. This will produce nitrogen-rich organic fertilizer and renewable energy, while reducing landfill gas emissions and the volume of waste for final landfill disposal.

CEREM is a Methane to Markets public-private alliance between a US environmental agency supporter, the municipal Public Services department of the city of Puerto Vallarta, the University of Oregon, Lane Community College Northwest Energy Education Institute and a team of international experts from the United States, the United Kingdom and Nepal. The CEREM project advances the technology of methane capture, employing an international team of engineers and renewable methane experts willing to donate in-kind to create a model for electrical power generation from wastes. The project is designed as a model for future expansion of appropriate urban waste management systems and energy generation that coalesces the physical properties of methane with the most cost-effective technologies for urban energy generation. CEREM will feature:

•    Pollution and greenhouse gas emission reduction and elimination
•    The advantages to gas yields of source separation and cost-benefits compared to landfill gas capture
•    Low operating and maintenance costs using a Stirling engine power generation for combined heat and power, to heat digesters and eliminate the need for gas filtration or heat exchangers
•    Structural superiority and cost-effectiveness of subterranean, fixed-lid digester design to provide durable digesters that can safely share their  footprint for other purposes

The project is designed to explore and provide solutions to some of the greatest waste management and public service issues for urban centers. Over reliance on non-renewable resources for urban energy needs, coupled with inefficient and/ or ineffective waste management systems are significant challenges, especially for developing areas of the world. CEREM’s renewable methane model promotes energy diversification from a renewable urban source. By providing expert assistance and directing international resources to the waste management field, the CEREM alliance is intended to provide root cause solutions.

Lack of information in the scientific, engineering and academic communities about renewable methane energy is a barrier to the implementation and dissemination of biogas technology in developing and industrialized countries. The proposed project will address this informational gap, offering an educational visitor’s center and fully accessible digester demonstration site, a Plant Operating Manual and training for biogas power plant operators.  The newly arrived, production-ready Stirling engine addresses several important technical barriers to biogas power generation. This unit has the ability to process gas, contaminated with siloxanes . The Stirling’s quiet operation and mechanical simplicity make it ideally suited for small-scale municipal power generation.

The three phases of the CEREM project are intended to promote energy security, greenhouse gas elimination and waste recycling through anaerobic digestion and renewable methane capture. Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco offers a strategic location for such a model, visible to the national and international communities and prepared to leverage resources to address their significant waste management issues. Finally, through local collaborations, CEREM will build a market for biogas slurry as an alternative to inorganic fertilizer for farmers in the surrounding areas.

CEREM is designed to support energy security for daily life and in case of natural or energy disasters. Linking cutting-edge energy technology to the urban waste management program in a model location, CEREM aims to promote economic growth and educate communities, contributing to environmental and social stability. The present 12-month project is designed to facilitate expansion and replication of the anaerobic digestion waste-processing array at the Jalisco site and will provide a facility for US and Mexican biogas power plant operator training.

The Puerto Vallarta project includes plans for possible future expansion through installing more digesters on the CEREM array to process the city’s entire organic waste tonnage. Additionally, CEREM partners have expertise in the field of landfill gas capture, lending to the possible capture of gas at the city’s recently abandoned landfill.

An appropriately planned and designed renewable methane program can be used to address two of the major problems facing urban centers: unsustainable energy dependence and inefficient/ineffective waste management. Biogas capture in an AD system promotes economic exploitation of renewable methane energy and carbon credit gain in line with the Kyoto protocol of 1997 through reduced landfill gas emission. Biogas processing diverts organic waste, and subsequently reduces the need to landfill. It improves human health by reducing the pathogen-carrying potential of organic waste, and lowers odors at the landfill site. Additionally, it facilitates use of post-consumer material as organic fertilizer, closing the loop in organic waste management.

Biogas project, Bolivia, a demonstration

 

There are many examples of waste-to-energy projects, around the world. Biodigestion is a simple, efficient technology, that capture’s and capitalizes on the natural process of anaerobic waste break-down. Here is an example in Bolivia. 

CEREM represented at the AASHE2008 Conference, Raleigh, NC, USA

During the three-day Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education Conference, CEREM tested the waters of the ’sustainability’ community, for knowledge of bio energy. Over 1,400 individuals and groups represented institutions of education and businesses at the second bi annual AASHE conference, with over double attendance over the 2006 conference. Presenters touched on the ‘greening’ of college campuses with the application of localized food networks, on-site waste managment, permaculture gardens, examples were presented of international internship programs. Of special interest, a Thailand-based educational insitution attended the conference with a goal to offer the curriculum and model to other interested international or local (USA) organizations, CEREM will likely consult this model to learn how best to structure the internship opportunities in the Puerto Vallarta project.

A major conference goal for manager and CEREM ambassador Christina Larson was to gauge interest and knowledge of renewable methane technology. As hypothesized, few attendees encountered knew that methane can efficiently be used as an urban energy source, before the waste hits the landfill. The dual flow of usable outputs from CEREM’s pre landfill methane biodigester system sprouted great interest. As one student commented:

” Its closing the loop of waste, directing the nutrients from the organic food-waste material back into the community, for continued use!” 

Students engaged in the conversations at AASHE were keenly aware of the benefits of nutrient cycling, a topic that Vandana Shiva emphasized strongly in her presentation on Food and Democracy. However, renewable methane neither formally enter into the conference topics, nor was it mentioned along-side wind and solar power alternatives in the speeches of Lester Brown and Van Jones, both of whom listed a suite of renewable energy solutions to intercept potential future energy challenges.

Despite what at times feels like slow change in the field of energy managment and generation from renewable sources, the AASHE conference demonstrated a community dedicated to see renewable energy hit the main stream. Everyone recognized the relevancy of new urban managment design, using the AASHE as a forum for conversation and modeling of new potential futures. Students are passionate about the sustainability conversation, and eager to get involved in real-world experience in the field. Perhaps CEREM will present the post-consumer, pre-landfill model for energy generation at the next AASHE; student interns in the field of sustainability will certainly be involved before then, sharing their passion and creativity with the CEREM project, as we reshape the future of civilization.

Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco

In FY2009 the city of Puerto Vallarta will apply a program of organic waste separation in compliance with a Jalisco State law. This innovative new program will divert organic waste from the city landfill to produce compost for agricultural soil amendment while reducing greenhouse gas emissions from methane, generated in area landfills. Household waste, food waste from the city’s restaurants and hotels, and city landscaping and maintenance debris will be aerobically composted to provide soil amendment and help offset Jalisco’s inorganic fertilizer imports.

As part of this program, the city of Puerto Vallarta’s Public Services department will join in partnership with Complejo de Energia Renovable, Mexico (CEREM) to include planning, construction and operation of an anaerobic digester array and biogas power plant for electrical co-generation at the site. A portion of the organic waste received at the composting site will be diverted to the CEREM facility to produce biogas that will fuel a 43 kW Stirling engine generator. Power generated at the CEREM facility will be distributed into the city electrical system for renewable energy and carbon credits.

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Through the anaerobic digestion process, bacteria consume volatile solids in organic matter to produce biogas, which consists of methane (CH4) and carbon dioxide (CO2), with trace amounts of hydrogen sulfide (H2S) and water vapor. The methane content of biogas is typically 70% and it can be burned in stationary electrical equipment or for home cooking and heating. In comparison to non-renewable natural gas, (87% methane) which requires 65 million years to create, renewable methane energy can be generated at any time and applied instead of fossil fuels to meet everyday energy needs.

During the anaerobic digestion process, nitrogen is converted into ammonia, a form of fertilizer that is more easily absorbed by plants. With special handling procedures to prevent evaporation, the slurry can be land applied using a spike wheel applicator on local agricultural fields and city green spaces. Nitrogen-rich fertilizer from AD systems has been shown to improve crop yields up to 30% on some crops . CEREM plans to engage a study the safety and economic advantages of biogas slurry in cradle-to-cradle waste stream utilization. Combined with a proper fertilization schedule, biogas slurry can eliminate Nitrous Oxide (N20) emissions, which has a global warming potential 123 times that of CO2 .

CEREM will provide a model of a municipal scale biogas power plant that incorporates the most efficient and cost-effective technology and processes. This model will address the single greatest obstacle preventing widespread implementation of renewable methane for energy. Despite the simplicity of its manufacture, scientists, engineers and the educators who advise policymakers lack adequate knowledge of renewable methane’s potential. CEREM plans to act as a site for information dissemination, facilitating the work of Methane to Markets partners and biogas development experts as we attempt to promote full exploitation of waste. Advocates for renewable methane energy are created, through seeing the benefits of such simple technology.
The planning, construction and operation of the CEREM facility will be carried out by a team of leading experts from around the world in the areas of renewable methane gas and power co-generation. Widely mistaken for a rural technology dependent on agricultural waste, renewable methane, can be cost-effectively generated from feedstocks readily available within an urban environment. For renewable methane energy, no extra energy or resources must be spent on transportation than for ordinary waste removal. The CEREM project will provide a model of a properly planned and designed municipal biogas program that works cooperatively with the physical properties of methane, and local waste management needs helping public service departments meet essential citizen and environmental imperatives.