It is high time to vigorously develop bio-natural gas

The Russia-Ukraine conflict has triggered a global energy crisis. In order to ensure the safe and stable supply of gas in our country, paying attention to the development of biological gas and making up for the gas supply gap are important measures to ensure that "the rice bowl of energy must be in our own hands", and have very important strategic significance to improve our gas security capability.

Recently, the Asian natural gas supply market has shown a trend of increasing bids and decreasing volumes. China's natural gas imports mainly liquefied natural gas. At present, Australia is the largest source of China's LNG imports, accounting for 40% of the total imports. In the next 10 years, it is expected that the import of natural gas from Russia will hardly exceed 15% of China's total import. The United States has become the world's largest exporter of liquefied natural gas, and recently, Australia has restricted the export of liquefied natural gas, and the uncertainty of the international natural gas market has increased significantly due to the impact of geopolitics.

With the promotion of China's carbon peak carbon neutral goal, the amount of natural gas has increased greatly, resulting in rising demand and external dependence, and the difficulty of safety protection has increased sharply. According to the data of the National Development and Reform Commission, China's natural gas consumption in 2021 is 372.6 billion cubic meters, and the external dependence is as high as 45%. Although China is increasing the development of natural gas, the increase in production still lags behind the increase in consumption. Moreover, with the development of our economy, the demand for natural gas will continue to increase.

According to the National Energy Administration is expected that by 2025 China's natural gas consumption will reach 430 billion to 450 billion cubic meters, by 2030 will reach 550 billion to 600 billion cubic meters, the gap is expected to be as high as 200 billion cubic meters. Therefore, while stabilizing domestic production and import channels, it is necessary to open up gas sources through multiple channels. If the use of livestock and poultry manure, crop straw and other organic waste to develop biological gas, by 2030 can achieve about 50 billion cubic meters of development, not only can make up for the shortage of natural gas supply, provide low-carbon energy, but also reduce methane emissions, promote carbon neutrality. We should prepare for the rainy day and be prepared for the crisis, not only from the perspective of ecological environmental protection, but also from the perspective of ensuring national energy security to attach great importance to the development of biological gas.

■■ Development of biological natural gas

Great significance

Biogas is purified from biogas and is known internationally as biomethane gas or renewable natural gas. Biogas is a combustible mixture of organic matter produced by microbial decomposition under anaerobic (anaerobic) conditions, while eliminating pathogens in it, and ultimately leaving nutrient-rich fertilizer as a byproduct. The main components of biogas are methane and carbon dioxide, the methane content is about 60%, purified to more than 93% is biological natural gas, the calorific value is close to natural gas, can be used as car gas or pipeline gas, high economic value.

In recent years, Europe and North America are accelerating the development of biological gas, and international energy giants have also accelerated their entry into the field of biological gas. Bp paid $4.1 billion for a U.S. producer of renewable natural gas on Oct. 17. Currently, the United States has become the world's largest biomethane market. Between 2020 and 2021, Europe's biomethane production will increase by 40%, with 87% of it connected to urban gas networks. Biomethane consumption in the EU is expected to account for 30-40% of total gas consumption by 2050.

According to the "Double carbon" Development Report of China's biogas industry, the amount of organic waste such as agricultural, rural, urban and industrial wastewater that can be used for biogas production in China is about 4.27 billion tons, 360 million tons and 6.54 billion tons, respectively, and the potential to produce biogas exceeds 500 billion cubic meters. It is estimated that by 2030, the biogas production potential can be obtained by about 169 billion cubic meters, achieving a reduction of 300 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent.

China is a big country of breeding industry, and a large amount of livestock and poultry manure has become a difficult problem of rural environmental governance. The development of biological natural gas is the main way of harmless and resource utilization of organic waste such as livestock and poultry manure. In recent years, the use of animal manure to develop bio-natural gas in China has achieved good results. For example, Shandong Minhe Animal Husbandry annually treats 450,000 tons of chicken manure, 300,000 cubic meters of sewage, generates 20 million tons of electricity annually, produces 50,000 tons of solid organic fertilizer, 160,000 tons of water-soluble fertilizer, and 15 million cubic meters of biological natural gas, and successfully registered CDM projects in the United Nations and obtains 1 million U.S. dollars in income, with significant environmental, social and economic benefits. On October 1, the national standard "biological gas" was officially implemented, laying the technical foundation for accelerating the industrialization of biological gas in China.