[Digestion] Subsidies, funding, and politics of AD in the U.S.

Thu Feb 17 12:22:37 CST 2011

Al,

By non-subsidized I mean that the value of all of the end products - solids
reduction, wastewater treatment, nutrient recovery. energy recovery - cover
the capital and operating costs of AD over some reasonable investment
period.  

I want to define the gap, if there is one, between the actual cost of
processing wastes using AD and the value of the products I can make. 

In the case of the winery I mentioned earlier I need to determine if AD can
offset the current costs of disposal of the grape pomace and wastewater
sludge. If not, then what is the gap between the cost of processing the
wastes using AD and the current disposal cost or market cost of end
products? If I assume commercial values for organic fertilizer products for
the liquid effluent and composted soil amendment for the biosolids then what
is the cost of power? If it is $150/MWh then the gap between my cost and
what I can sell it for today - $60/MWh - is  $90/MWh. Then I would need tax
credits, grants, RECs or feed-in tariffs (like $190/kWh in Eastern Canada)
to justify the investment. If the government buys down the risk (higher
cost) of the new technology then will it still be a feasible conversion
process in the long term, say 20 years.

Tom 

From: digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org
[mailto:digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of
aclark at pennpowersystems.com
Sent: Thursday, February 17, 2011 6:43 AM
To: For Discussion of Anaerobic Digestion
Cc: 'For Discussion of Anaerobic Digestion';
digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org
Subject: Re: [Digestion] Subsidies, funding, and politics of AD in the U.S.

Yes, there are a  number of "privately" owned AD projects operating on
various foodwaste and agricultural waste products. Perhaps you might define
"non-subsidized"? All projects are picking up some form of tax credits,
grants, or renewable energy credits. I consider these subsidies however
perhaps you mean something else? 

"Tom Miles" <tmiles at trmiles.com>
Sent by: digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org

02/17/2011 12:04 AM

Please respond to
For Discussion of Anaerobic Digestion <digestion at lists.bioenergylists.org>

To

"'For Discussion of Anaerobic Digestion'"
<digestion at lists.bioenergylists.org>

cc

Subject

Re: [Digestion] Subsidies, funding, and politics of AD in the U.S.

A related question: are there any privately funded, non-subsidized,
successful AD Projects in North America?

Tom Miles

From: digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org
[mailto:digestion-bounces at lists.bioenergylists.org] On Behalf Of
armoss at umd.edu
Sent: Wednesday, February 16, 2011 8:50 PM
To: digestion at lists.bioenergylists.org
Subject: [Digestion] Subsidies, funding, and politics of AD in the U.S.

Hello all-
I realize this is a topic that must get attention fairly often from this
group, so apologies if I'm asking you to revisit too recent of a post.  I'm
interested in finding out what subsidies and funding streams are currently
available to the AD community for digester projects and AD businesses
operating in the U.S.  I'm aware of some limited carbon trading and
occasional grants from the USDA for large-scale agricultural operations but,
aside from that, what subsidies or outside funding are AD companies able to
obtain?  Are their subsidies available to their clients?  What aspects of
the recent stimulus bill (if any) have been successfully applied to the AD
field and how far are those funds from drying up?  Are there any state
specific programs that any of you are familiar with?  Also, is there a
portion of the AD community that is currently organized enough to have a
voice and a presence in Washington, D.C.?  If not, what channels are
start-up! ! s using to promote the technology and/or industry as a whole?

Thanks ahead of time for your responses.

Sincerely, 

Andrew R. Moss

Sustainable Agriculture Research & Education Fellow

University of Maryland Dept. of Environmental Science and Technology

1445 Animal Sci./Ag. Engineering (Bldg. 142)

University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742

Phone:  (865) 363-5535

_______________________________________________
Digestion mailing list

to Send a Message to the list, use the email address
Digestion at bioenergylists.org

to UNSUBSCRIBE or Change your List Settings use the web page
http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/digestion_lists.bioenergyli
sts.org

for more information about digestion, see
Beginner's Guide to Biogas
http://www.adelaide.edu.au/biogas/
and the Biogas Wiki http://biogas.wikispaces.com/

This e-mail and any of its attachments contains PRIVILEGED AND CONFIDENTIAL
INFORMATION belonging to the Penn Detroit Diesel Allison LLC family of
companies. This e-mail is intended only for the use of the individual(s) or
the entity to which it is addressed. If you are not the intended recipient,
you are hereby notified that any dissemination or copying is strictly
prohibited. If you have received this in error, please notify us immediately
by e-mail reply and permanently delete the original and any copy of the
e-mail, its attachments, and printouts. If a phone call is required contact
us at 215-335-0500. Thank you for your cooperation.

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.bioenergylists.org/pipermail/digestion_lists.bioenergylists.org/attachments/20110217/d07d7a17/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image001.gif
Type: image/gif
Size: 13503 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <http://lists.bioenergylists.org/pipermail/digestion_lists.bioenergylists.org/attachments/20110217/d07d7a17/attachment.gif>