Design of a Biogas Processing System to Provide Renewable Fuel for Small Farms

This work looks at providing a versatile, renewable fuel using a consumer scale biogas processing system. Biogas is produced by anaerobic digestion of organic waste and can serve as an easily obtainable, renewable replacement for natural gas. However, in its raw form, biogas does not contain as much methane as natural gas, therefore it has a lower energy density than its fossil fuel counterpart. This lower energy density limits the use cases. For example, transportation is not possible with raw biogas. Raw biogas also contains additional contaminants that can be harmful to the equipment and nearby people. Because of this, upgrading biogas to biomethane is appealing to users. Most upgrading and storage processes for biomethane are designed for large scale applications. This work identified water scrubbing and bottling as feasible upgrading and storage methods for biomethane on the scale of a small farm. This information was then used to aid in the design of a biogas processing system for a small farm.