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For Biothermica, reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is in the company’s DNA. Since 1987 the Quebec SME has been developing technology to cut methane emissions at coal mines and produce renewable energy from the biogas formed at landfill sites.
“Over the past 15 years, our projects have helped cut 15 to 16 million tons of CO2 equivalent emissions,” said Guy Drouin, founder and president of this company specializing in the development of carbon and energy projects, biogas services, and air purification.
It’s a sizeable challenge given methane’s impact on GHG emissions. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), methane is 28 to 34 times more harmful than CO2.
Denis Leclerc, president and CEO of the Écotech Québec cleantech cluster, notes that Biothermica is active in a high-growth industry because it has developed two solutions to climate change. “Its technology makes it possible not only to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy, but also helps reduce GHG emissions.”
A power plant fueled by garbage
Biothermica’s flagship project is clearly its 25 megawatt Gazmont power plant, located near the Miron quarry in Montreal. The property, which is owned by the City of Montreal, is one of the largest landfills in North America. Some 36 million tons of waste materials have been buried there since 1968. After taking possession of the site in 1988, the City of Montreal installed a system to collect biogas (including methane) at the landfill.
Aware of the site’s energy potential, in the early 1990s the municipality issued a call for tenders to produce electricity from biogas. Biothermica won the call for tenders.
“We had developed a method for assessing biogas availability at the Miron quarry. And we were the first to do this in Canada,” stressed Guy Drouin.
After a long environmental approval process, construction of the C$38 million (US$28.7 million) power plant began in April 1995.
It was commissioned in November 1996. Government corporation Hydro-Québec, the largest energy producer in Quebec, buys all the electricity produced at the site.
From 1996 to 2014, the Gazmont power plant helped cut 500,000 tons of CO2 equivalent GHG emissions a year at the Miron quarry.
Projects in El Salvador and the United States
Biothermica has also completed a similar project in El Salvador, at a landfill site in the city of Nejapa, located north of San Salvador. This project is part of the Kyoto Protocol’s Joint Implementation Mechanism, which authorizes GHG collection and reduction projects in developing countries carried out by companies from developed countries.
The Nejapa project had two phases that required C$15 million (US$11.6 million) in investments. Phase 1 consisted of capturing and burning biogas from the Nejapa landfill, where trash from San Salvador is buried. Phase 2 was to build a 6 MW power plant to produce electricity from biogas. According to Biothermica’s estimations, the Nejapa project will help cut CO2 equivalent GHG emissions by 200,000 tons a year from 2006 to 2027.
The company is also involved in a project to recover methane from a U.S. coal mine in Alabama using its VAMOX technology. The mine is operated by Jim Walter Resources, a division of Walter Energy. This project evaluated at US$30 million is not about producing energy, but destroying methane. If all goes as planned, starting in 2016–2017, 400,000 tons of the CO2 equivalent methane emitted by the coal mine will be destroyed every year. The GHG emission reduction credits will be sold on the California carbon market.
Carbon market credits
According to Pierre-Olivier Pineau, an energy specialist at HEC Montréal, companies like Biothermica with this kind of technology are positioned in an industry that will offer more and more business opportunities.
“Carbon will be increasingly taxed in North America and around the world,” said Pineau. “So companies that can convert GHG reductions into carbon market credits will be in a good position.”
Biothermica would one day also like to carry out methane collection projects in other coal mines in China, Australia, and Ukraine. “Ukraine has mines with the highest concentrations of methane in the world,” noted Guy Drouin. “However, our project there is currently on hold due to the conflict in eastern Ukraine.”
Biothermica also has its eyes on the Chinese market. China is the world’s biggest coal producer, according to the World Coal Association. “We are looking at three projects there that have potential for us,” said the president of Biothermica.
For more information: http://www.biothermica.com/
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