UNIDO South Africa
Project status: completed
Production of Biogas Guidelines for the South African Market
The United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) collaborates with the Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA), the Department of Energy (DoE), the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and other entities in the project “Promoting organic waste-to-energy and other low carbon technologies in small, medium and micro enterprises (SMMEs) scale: Accelerating biogas market development in South Africa”.The project aims at promoting market-based biogas technologies in medium, small and micro-sized enterprises in South Africa in connection with the country’s drive to promote the development of the renewable energy and green economy sectors.
One of the main challenges for the development of the biogas sector in South Africa is the lack of knowledge as well as decision-making tools for commercial stakeholders. Through this project, the German Biogas Association in close collaboration with the South African Biogas Industry Association (SABIA) and the German company Anaergia, developed such tools:
- Biogas technology guide book: extensive compilation of biogas topics from biogas utilization, process biology up to topics llike biogas economics considering the local South African situation are included in this publication.
- Biogas project development and appraisal tool is an MS-Office Excel-based tool which allows decision-makers to make a basic evaluation of biogas potential and economical feasibility.
- Biogas project operation manual: directed at persons dealing with the daily activities taking place at the biogas plant, includes topics like monitoring, maintenance, documentation, troubleshooting and many more.
These tools will be further developed by UNIDO and made publicly available, though a date has not yet been communicated.