EcoAD

Title: Developing Economic solutions for on-farm Anaerobic Digestion technologies under Irish conditions (EcoAD)
Start Date: 2020
End Date: 2023
Funding Body: Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) under the Research Development and Demonstration (RD&D) funding programme; Gas Networks Ireland (GNI)
Coordinator: Dr David Wall, MaREI, the SFI Centre for Energy, Climate and Marine, Environmental Research Institute, University College Cork (UCC), Ireland.
Principal Investigators: Prof Jerry Murphy, Dr Richen Lin, Dr Richard O’Shea
Research Area: Advanced Fuels in the Circular Economy
Website: EcoAD

Introduction and Aim

Agriculture remains the largest contributor to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in Ireland accounting for 33% of total emissions. Ireland needs to initiate ‘green agriculture’ practices and carbon capture techniques.

On-farm anaerobic digestion for the production of biomethane is one method that can contribute to greening agriculture and broader decarbonisation in heat and transport. However, conventional anaerobic digestion systems for biomethane production may suffer from high cost and low digestion efficiency, thus hindering commercial application.

The EcoAD project intends to develop economic solutions for future on-farm anaerobic digestion technologies using typical Irish farm-based feedstock (animal slurries, excess grass silage, and straw). Finding the most efficient biomethane production scenarios, most importantly that are cost-effective, is of relevance in transitioning to a low carbon economy. Ultimately this project will deliver future best practices and assess the economic viability of on-farm biomethane production from novel integrated anaerobic digestion systems.