REPORTS Biogas

Monitoring of methane
emissions from biogas plants
by Torsten Reinelt, Tina Clau and Jan Liebetrau

Profound knowledge about the greenhouse gas emissions from biogas plants and the subsequent development
of emission mitigation strategies are a major key point for the acceptance of the biogas technology. Neverthe-
less, not only ecological, but also for economic and safety issues, a reliable emission source detection and the
determination of the emission rate is very important. The article reviews the variety of different methane emis-
sion sources on a biogas plant and the methods to determine the emission rate from these sources. That allows
the deduction of different mitigation strategies.

1. INTRODUCTION Due to the construction and the process technology of

With the launch of the Renewable Energy Law, the use of
renewable energy including biogas gained importance
during the last 17 years in Germany, which led to an ele-
vating number of operated biogas plants. However, the
biogas sector is increasingly confronted with different
challenges, e.g., the continuing discussion about the use
of energy crops (dinner plate or fuel tank), higher pro-
duction costs in comparison to other renewable energies
(e.g. solar energy, wind onshore), but also their contribu-
tion to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Since methane
is the main component of biogas, the avoidance of meth-
ane emissions in the operation of biogas plants is very
important.
In particular, methane emissions became a very
important issue within the biogas sector in the last ten
years, because of its great influence on different levels for
the biogas technology. Methane emissions can affect:
the plant safety, because methane forms an explosive
mixture with air (4.4 vol.% methane and 16.5 vol.%
oxygen) 0
the ecology of the technology, because methane is a
potent greenhouse gas with a Global Warming Poten-
tial of 28 0
the economy of the technology, because methane
losses cannot be combusted and consequently
decrease the revenues of the operator.
The mitigation of (fugitive) methane emissions from
biogas plants requires a sufficient emission monitoring.
the mostly agricultural biogas plants in Germany, only a
low number of stationary sources like the off-gas from
the combined heat and power (CHP) plant are available
for a standardized emission monitoring 0, 0. To date, there
is consequently no effective methane emission control of
biogas plants. Most German regulations refer to safety of
the biogas producing plants, and not to a limitation of
the emissions. One exception is, e.g. the German TA-Luft
(Technical Instructions on Air Quality Control) which will
be revised in the near future.
Besides few stationary sources, several unknown fugi-
tive methane emission sources can exist (e.g. biogas leak-
ages) or an emission source emits only temporarily (e.g.
operational emissions from pressure relief valves of the
biogas storages). Depending on the purpose of monitor-
ing, several approaches for leakage detection and meth-
ane emission quantification are available. For plant safety
checks, leakage detection by usage of portable methane
detectors measuring the methane concentration at
biogas-bearing plant components is sufficient. In con-
trast, the ecological evaluation of biogas plants including
the calculation of greenhouse gas balances requires the
overall methane emission rate of the whole biogas plant
(from substrate storage to the biogas utilization). Public
authorities require reliable methane emission factors and
standardized measurement methods to monitor the
plants. Possible measurement approaches and exem-
plary results are described in the following.

28 gas for energy Issue 2/2017


2. MEASUREMENT APPROACHES
For the determination of methane emissions from biogas
plants, different measurement approaches including on-
site and remote sensing methods have been developed
in the recent years. The different methods will be intro-
duced in the following subsections.
2.1 On-site approach
The basic principle of the on-site approach needs two
main steps. The first one is a survey of the plant to iden-
tify all existing emission sources, both the unknown and
known sources. The unknown emission sources are usu-
ally leakages on biogas-bearing plant components. The
leakage identification can be carried out by means of an
infrared camera and hand held methane detectors.
Known sources, which are nevertheless hard to quantify,
can be open digestate storage tanks (area source) or
pressure relief valves (time-variant emission characteris-
tic). For each identified emission source, a suitable
method for the quantification of the emission rate has to
be applied 0. Depending on the source type, the quanti-
fication method differs. Thus, three exemplary methods
are described more precisely:
Biogas REPORTS
Quantification of methane emissions from leakages:
The commonly used quantification methods for leakages
are dynamic chambers and the similar High Volume Sam-
pling systems, respectively 0, 0. The dynamic chamber
(foil or fixed hood) encapsulates the leakage and is aer-
ated by fresh air provided by a blower. The encapsulation
avoids an uncontrolled emission in the atmosphere and
converts the fugitive source into a conducted source. In
the off-gas pipe of the dynamic chamber, the volume
flow and the methane concentration are analyzed like in
a conducted source. Afterwards, the emission mass flow
from the investigated leakage is calculated 0.
Quantification of methane emissions from open
digestate storage tanks:
For analysis of open digestate storage tanks, static cham-
bers are usually used. The basic principle of the method is
the encapsulation of a certain part of the digestate sur-
face (<1m2) by setting the chamber onto the surface. By
determining a surface specific emission rate (e.g. in g CH4
m-2 h-1), the overall emission from the whole storage tank
is extrapolated to the whole digestate surface area. In
contrast to dynamic chambers, fresh air or another carrier
gas does not pass the static chamber, so the gas concen-
tration inside the chamber is increasing over time. This
Figure 1: Moni-
toring of oper-
ational meth-
ane emissions
from pressure
relief valves
(PRV) at a full
scale biogas
plant
Issue 2/2017 gas for energy 29
 REPORTS Biogas

increase of the gas concentration over time is propor-
tional to the emission rate 0, 0.
Quantification of operational methane emissions
from pressure relief valves:
Pressure relief valves are safety units, which protect the
biogas storages from unbalanced pressure conditions by
the release of raw biogas (overpressure) or the suction of
fresh air (underpressure). Due to the very time-variant
emission characteristic, operational methane emissions
from pressure relief valves have to be continuously moni-
tored by means of explosion proof sensors in long-term
investigations 0. For the release of raw biogas at overpres-
sure conditions, the pressure relief valve usually has an
exhaust pipe where the monitoring equipment measur-
ing flow velocity or temperature can be installed [8]. With
the flow velocity, the emitted methane volume flow and
the duration of single triggering events is monitored. A
temperature sensor only registers the frequency and the
duration of the single triggering events, since the increas-
ing and decreasing temperature inside the exhaust pipe
indicate the beginning and ending of an event, respec-
tively. Figure 1 shows a continuous monitoring of pres-
sure relief valves at a full-scale biogas plant.
After quantification of the single emission sources
with the on-site methods, the overall methane emission
rate from the biogas plant is calculated by summing up
the single components 0, 0.
2.2 Remote sensing approach
With remote sensing approaches, the overall methane
emission of a biogas plant can be determined by measur-
ing in a proper distance from the source area. With these
methods, a monitoring of the methane emissions from the
whole plant over a certain period (usually some hours) is
possible. Thus, also time variant sources or emissions occur-
ring at certain operational modes can be recorded. Never-
theless, the usage of remote sensing methods requires a
well accessible area surrounding the biogas plant.
There are three different remote sensing methods to
determine the overall methane emission rate of a biogas
plants. Using the first method, the average methane con-
centration over an open path (upwind and downwind of
the biogas plant) is determined with an optical spec-
trometer, using, e.g. tunable diode absorption or Fourier
transform infrared spectroscopy. Together with meteoro-
logical data, the emissions from the source area can be
determined computationally by dispersion modelling
methods, e. g. Gaussian plume model or backward
Lagrangian stochastic model. Examples for this measure-
ment approach can be found in [9-11]. Especially for this
remote sensing approach, the surrounding area of the
plant and suitable wind conditions, i.e., absence of other
unknown emission sources, a good accessibility in the
downwind area, preferably flat terrain and a wind velocity
of at least 3 ms-1, are prerequisites for a successful reliable
methane emission quantification.
The Tracer Dispersion Method (TDM) uses a con-
trolled release of a specific tracer gas (frequently acety-
lene) from the source area and concentration measure-
ments of the tracer and methane downwind of the
biogas plant. The method assumes that the released
tracer gas disperses into the atmosphere likewise the
emitted methane from the plant. The concentration of
these two gases can be measured statically, e.g. on an
open path in downwind direction of the biogas plant, or
dynamically by driving on the streets around the biogas
plant while measuring the concentration of the tracer
and the methane, e.g. with very sensitive cavity ring-
down sensors [12].
A third method is the use of Differential Absorption
Lidar (DIAL), which so far was rarely used for the investiga-
tion of biogas plants, due to the high instrument and
operational costs. With a DIAL system, the range-resolved
gas concentration of different target gases can be deter-
mined along an open path. A helicopter-based version
was already used on a German biogas plant 0. A ground-
based version have been recently used for method com-
parison measurements at a biogas plant within the cur-

Table 1: Dis-/advantages of onsite and remote sensing approach

Onsite approach Remote sensing approach

I dentification and quantification of single sources Longtime measurements with high resolution possible
Strenghts

D  irect mitigation strategies can be deduced No influence on plant operation

L ow detection limit (single source and total emission rate)
Independent from weather conditions
E ffort adjustable to the requirements
T ime variant emission sources are difficult to identify
Constraints
Time effort quite independent from plant size
All emissions sources are recorded
Time variant emissions are detectable during long term measurements
No identification of single sources possible

U  nknown and diffuse sources are not included Highly dependent on wind conditions and topology around the plant
H  igh effort on large plants with many digesters Influence of the uncertainties of dispersion models and/or atmospheric
I nfluence of measurement on emissions (e.g. chamber mixing
methods) Difficulties of separation of other sources nearby (e.g. barns)

30 gas for energy Issue 2/2017

 Biogas REPORTS

rent European research project MetHarmo (European
harmonization of methods to quantify methane emis-
sions from biogas plants, funded by ERA-NET and in Ger-
many represented by the Agency for Renewable
Resources FNR, support code: 22403215). By vertical
scanning in the downwind area of the biogas plant, emis-
sion plumes can be mapped and emission rates can be
calculated.
2.3 Dis-/advantages of both approaches
Both approaches, the on-site and the remote sensing
approach, have their strength and constraints. Table 1
confronts the approaches to each other and describes
their pros and cons.
3. METHANE EMISSIONS FROM BIOGAS
PLANTS MEASUREMENT RESULTS
point sources 55%; not every leakage was detected by
each team). However, the more important fact was that
both main sources (open digestate storage and pressure
relief valve of the compressor station) could not be meas-
ured from all on-site teams, because of missing equip-
ment (digestate storage) or changes of the plant opera-
tion (emitting PRV was fixed by the operator). The results
of the remote-sensing approach ranges from 0.6 to 3.0%
methane loss (cp. Table 1) and the individual results of
the two remote sensing teams also varied strongly
(IDMM: 0.6 1.7%methane loss, TDM 2.2 3.0%meth-
ane loss). The high variability of the results was attributed
to changes of the plant operation (turndown of the
chemical scrubber and additional operation of the water
scrubber), the different measurement times (caused by
changing wind conditions) and the analysis of the meth-
ane background concentration. However, the results still
were in a comparable range.

Table 2 shows a brief review of the most important pub-
lications about methane emissions in the biogas sector
determined by the introduced approaches and methods
of section 2.
However, there is still no standardization of the differ-
ent measurement approaches which makes the existing
results difficult to compare. A first step towards a stand-
ardization of the different methods was realized by a joint
comparison measurement of different European meas-
urement teams carried out at a Swedish biological waste
treatment plant in 2014 [6]. The results from the on-site
approach ranges from 0.6 to 2.1% methane loss (min
max, cp. Table 2) and the individual results of the four
on-site teams varied strongly (coefficient of variation for
4. CONCLUSIONS AND OUTLOOK
On a biogas plant, very different methane emission
sources are present. Depending on the purpose of the
measurement and the kind of the source, different meth-
ods to determine the methane emission rate are available.
Meanwhile, several published investigations dealing
with methane emission measurements on biogas plants
are available, which are, however, difficult to compare.
Consequently, the used approaches and methods need
to be harmonized. A first comparison measurement was
carried out in 2014 [6]. However, there is still need for fur-
ther harmonization. Within the current research project
MetHarmo, this harmonization process is continued. In

Table 2: Review of emission measurements and determined methane emission factors from different biogas
plants
Approach Plant type Measured methane Refe-
(Number of investigated plants) emission factor rence
On-site (leak detection, standard methods, Agricultural (8) 1.1 13.7 % CH4 [5]
dynamic and static chambers) Agricultural with upgrading unit (2)
Biowaste treatment (10) 15295 kg CO2eq [7]
Mg-1Waste [7]
On-site (permanent monitoring of PRV) Agricultural (2) Plant A 0.1% CH4 [8]
Plant B 3.9% CH4
Remote sensing (IDMM) Agricultural (5) 1.6 5.5% CH4 [11]
Agricultural (1) 3.1% CH4 [9]
Agricultural (1) 4% CH4 [10]
Remote sensing (TDM) Waste water treatment (1) 2.1 32.7% CH4 [14]
On-site (leak detection, standard methods, dyna- Biowaste treatment (1) 0.6 2.1% CH4 [6]
mic and static chambers, High volume sampling)
Remote sensing (IDMM and TDM) Biowaste treatment (1) 0.6 3.0% CH4 [6]
Remote sensing (DIAL, CHARM) Agricultural with upgrading unit (1) 0.4% CH4 [13]

Issue 2/2017 gas for energy 31

 REPORTS Biogas

October 2016, the first of two planned comparison meas-
urement campaigns within the MetHarmo project,
where different teams from Europe measuring the meth-
ane emission rate simultaneously at the same biogas
plant by using different methods has been carried out. As
a result, a joint guideline establishing standards for a
comparable and reliable methane emission quantifica-
tion will be developed.
In another current research project BetEmBGA
(Operational emissions from biogas plants BetEmBGA,
funded by the Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture
represented by the Agency for Renewable Resources
FNR, support code: 22020313), the emissions from pres-
sure relief valves are examined carefully. As already men-
tioned in section 2.1, pressure relief valves are a very
time-variant emission source depending on the opera-
tional state of the biogas plant and the seasonal condi-
tions. Within the project, the PRVs of overall eight biogas
plants will be investigated over a full year. The first meas-
urement results show that pressure relief valves can be a
dominant methane emission source.
However, from the results acquired hitherto, effective
mitigation strategies to reduce fugitive methane emis-
sions can be deduced, and leading to new political
trends. The most important methane emission sources
from biogas plants are the methane slip of the biogas
combustion and open handling/storage of digestates as
well as operational methane emissions from PRV and
biogas leaks. Consequently, mitigation strategies have to
focus on these points.
In Germany, an intense discussion about methane
emissions from biogas plants has begun in the recent
years, which finally climaxed in the intended novella of
the German Technical Instructions on Air Quality Control

Table 3: Constructional and operational measures for the mitigation of methane emissions
Measure Advantage Disadvantage
Thermal post Reduction of the remaining carbon compounds (CO, Very high investment costs
combustion CH2O, CH4, Total organic carbon) below TA-Luft limits A t too low carbon content in the off-gas additional biogas
Long lifetime and low-maintenance compared to oxi- or natural gas feed is necessary for the operation
dation catalysts
Gastight Additional biogas storage capacity for flexible opera- Lagoons or very big high-level tanks cannot be gastight
covering of tion, when the storage tank is covered with an integ- covered subsequently or only with too high investment
open digestate rated biogas storage costs
storage tanks Investment costs can be amortized by additional gas
Constructive measures

production depending on the residual gas potential

Automatically Capture of biogas overproduction possible, which Attention to a correct implementation into the biogas sto-
operated flare avoids the triggering of PRVs rage management is necessary. That includes:
Regulation by pressure or filling level of the biogas Own compressor of the flare
storage possible Adjustment of control limits (e.g. pressure limit activating
the flare should be lower than limit pressure of the PRV)
Measurement points of the control limits (e.g. pressure
should be measured directly before/in the PRV)
Monitoring of An operator sees: Retrofitting of PRVs requires high investment costs due to:
PRVs How often a PRV emits Integration of explosive proof sensors and the implemen-
Which conditions cause the triggering of PRV (e.g. tation into the control system of the plant
atmospheric conditions, operational states) Additional measurement equipment integrated in the PRV
Errors of the biogas storage management (e.g. too needs a check of a technical expert and a notification to
small gas pipes, wrong adjustment of blowers form public authorities according to the Federal Immission Con-
air-inflated double membrane roofs, etc.) trol Act
Frequent CHP Lower emissions and higher electrical efficiency of Maintenance charges
maintenance the engine
Frequent Identification of biogas losses Charges for service provider
Operational measures

leakage Economic weighting of biogas losses and repair costs

detection is possible
Balanced Wise filling level in normal operation is for example Available measurement equipment for determining the
biogas filling 50% of the maximum capacity biogas filling level (e.g. cable pull transmitter) are relatively
level and Puffer capacity for balancing gas expansion caused imprecise in the lower and middle measurement range,
feeding by sudden changes of the atmospheric conditions or because the biogas storage foil does not mold consistently
strategies changes of the operational state Feeding strategies are more effective for projectable chan-
Reduced substrate demand, in particular for energy ges of the operational state (e.g. CHP maintenance) and
crops less effective for sudden changes of the operational state
(e.g. overheating of the CHP engine)

32 gas for energy Issue 2/2017


(TA-Luft). For the biogas sector in particular the introduc-
tion of an off-gas limit (1.0gTotal Carbon m-3) for the com-
bustion of biogas in combined heat and power (CHP)
plants as well as a limit for air collection systems (0.2 gTotal
-3
Carbon m ) would have the biggest impact. However, the
participating public authorities still discuss the draft and
it is currently not conceivable if the final draft still includes
such a limit value. Furthermore, there are several sources
which are not considered in regulations so far and which
are still discussed intensely, e.g. a definition of gas proof-
ness of membrane roofs or the monitoring of PRVs and
the operation of the flare (automatically vs. manually).
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AUTHORS
Mr. Torsten Reinelt
Deutsches Biomasseforschungszentrum
gemeinntzige GmbH
Leipzig, Germany,
Phone: +49 341 2434 374
Email: Torsten.Reinelt@dbfz.de
Dr. rer. Nat. Tina Clau
Deutsches Biomasseforschungszentrum
gemeinntzige GmbH
Leipzig, Germany
Phone: +49 341 2434 378
Email: Tina.Clauss@dbfz.de
Dr.-Ing. Jan Liebetrau
Deutsches Biomasseforschungszentrum
gemeinntzige GmbH
Leipzig, Germany
Phone: +49 341 2434 716
Email: Jan.Liebetrau@dbfz.de
Issue 2/2017 gas for energy 33