The new application will result in 435 less vehicle movements (1 in/ 1 out) per year. The total number of movements associated with the plant and the remote offtake points for digestate is 1,636 or 4-5 per day. The main improvement for local residents will be that crops, straw and manures will be processed onsite at Deal Farm rather than being stored for onward transfer.
Treatment onsite also reduces “double handling” and helps keeps local produce within the local area.
Crops and manures will be transported largely by tractor and trailer, whilst CO2 will be transported by tankers to ensure safety. Liquid digestate may be transported by HGV/ tanker and/or tractor and tanker – but most of it will be pumped to local fields for use directly on the land. More tractor and HGV movements would be expected during the short harvest windows for maize, grass and cereals. So in summary:
- Crops will come in short, two-week bursts at harvest
- Farm Yard Manures will come more regularly throughout the year when sheds “muck out”
- CO2 will be taken away regularly throughout the year
The plant will process manures produced by the landowner’s pig and poultry units as well as other local livestock farms and crops grown by farmers within 5km of the site. The plant will not be importing any material as feedstock from outside of the local area. The 2015 planning permission limits crops grown to within 5km of the plant and we expect to include the same condition on this application also.
Within up to 5km of the site, there are estimated to be over 50,000 pigs and 150,000 poultry, so there will be a significant interest from the local farms in the area. The following map shows the locations of some of the cattle, pig, and poultry farms we have identified within 2km and 5km of the Deal Farm Biogas Plant.
Farming is an intensive and technical industry (we’re trying to feed 65 million people), producing high volumes of products and by-products. The AD plant at Deal Farm will enable local farmers to put this material to good use (either through the production of biogas/ biomethane, or the creation of high-quality fetilisers) in a sustainable manner.
At present, Deal Farm and surrounding farms produce a significant amount of crops, straw and materials that have to be sent to market in bulk loads by HGV through the villages of Bressingham, Fersfield and Shelfhanger (for example, to British Sugar and the grain mills).
The delivery of the Deal Farm Biogas facility will mean that the materials produced by Deal Farm and by surrounding farmers are instead able to be processed by the AD plant. This greatly reduces the number of vehicle movements travelling out of the area to market.
In addition, the proposal of three digestate lagoons and remote ‘offtake’ points mean that the digestate produced by the plant is pumped directly out of the site via underground pipes. Again, this means less vehicles travelling to and from the plant to transport the digestate, and a further reduction in vehicle movements as local farmers will be using the digestate produced by the plant instead of chemical fertilisers, which often have to be imported in to replace lost fertility.
The liquid CO2 will be transported from the site in HGV’s, similar to those used by dairy farms to transport the milk, due to the requirement for the vehicles to be refrigerated. Liquid CO2 will be transported from the plant 5 days a week, with 1 vehicle travelling to and from the site on those days.
To ensure best practice for maize growing the following steps will be followed:
• Choosing the correct mid-maturing variety of maize that will be ready for early harvest in September
• Minimise soil disturbance in seedbed preparation
• Select fields which have a low risk of water run-off and soil erosion.
• There will be no excessive use of organic manures
• Harvest technique will be deployed to avoid water logging and drainage considerations made in the event of excess rain fall.
There is extremely low risk of leakage/spillage at the plant, given that the tanks are made from poured concrete, meaning there are no joints or sections to fail. In the very rare and unlikely event of any leakage/spillage, the tanks sit in a ‘containment’ area which is a concrete basin with an impermeable liner underneath – this is a requirement enforced by the Environment Agency to protect the land and minimise any negative impacts.
The volume of feedstock proposed as part of the new application is 23,950 tonnes. Feedstock materials will come directly from local farmers, and there is a 5km radius set for crops being processed at Deal Farm. No feed material will be imported from outside of the local area.
The AD process is considered a “wet” process, as the majority of feed material is damp by nature – therefore it is highly unlikely a fire would start or spread. In the unlikely event a fire was to occur, we have the firewater lagoon as an immediate source of water that can be pumped onto burning materials. More information on the fire risk will be available within the 73a planning application.
Biogas is environmentally sound, and every industrially developed nation worldwide, in taking responsibility for the damage caused by their economic growth, has a scheme to incentivise the increased production of biomethane to support renewable energy and enable farmers to reap the extensive sustainable benefits that being involved with biogas provides. The AD process – unlike other commercially available renewable sources – has the potential to not just be carbon neutral, but to be carbon negative.
There is CO 2 in biogas, but it is important to understand that the carbon produced is ‘atmospheric’ rather than ‘fossil.’ This means the CO 2 was taken from the air and locked into the plant when it was growing (unlike fossil fuels where the carbon has been buried for millions of years). Some of this CO 2 then goes into the biogas – and the remaining (larger) amount goes into the digestate which is put into the ground as fertiliser.
This site does not burn biogas. On this plant, the biogas is “cleaned” up to “mains gas” standards and injected into the local gas network. The molecules of biomethane are used by the end user of the gas – and so could be used for heating a house, cooking, or even producing CNG or LNG vehicle fuels. The biomethane that will be produced by the plant will be equivalent to displacing the fossil fuel gas used in 4,000 UK homes every year. Fundamentally, the biomethane produced will replace molecules of fossil fuel gas, making whatever it is used for more sustainable.
As part of the S73A, the plant intends to include “carbon capture” technology, which will produce green CO2. Carbon Dioxide is used in all sorts of industries – but most well-known for food and drinks (it’s the fizz in a can of cola). The carbon capture proposed for Deal Farm Biogas will extract up to 5,000 tonnes of liquid CO2 – that is the equivalent to 13,800,000 car road miles (or 1,150 cars off the road) every year – whilst creating green CO2 to be used across a range of industries.
The delivery of the AD plant will not impact local wildlife. Prior to development, this land was considered a low-grade crop field used to grow a mix of beet, cereals, and maize. Years of cropping, ploughing, drilling, and controlling weeds and pests in line with normal agricultural practices has meant that very few, if any, species of plants or animals will make their home on the site of the AD Plant.
On the other-hand, over 50 new trees, 1.5km of hedgerow habitat and a large area of wild meadow are proposed as part of the plans to help shield the development from view. In addition, the processing of manures in a gas-tight digester will reduce the release of pollutants into watercourses and the atmosphere that would otherwise be caused by storing it on pads and spreading it raw to land.
The plant also intends to work with feedstock suppliers and other bodies/organisations that set improved standards and more sympathetic methods for cropping that reduces the impact on soils, erosion and run off. More information will be available in the Ecology Report that will be submitted alongside the 73a planning application.
The local community will benefit in the following ways:
- Storengy always play an active part in the local community – contributing both finances and resources where they can assist in improvements
- The plant will reduce local farmer’s reliance on imported chemical fertilisers
- The plant will create at least 3 full time jobs locally and numerous other secondary employment opportunities in maintaining, feeding and managing the digestate from the plant.
- The plant will contribute to the UK meeting its net zero targets and in doing so will be helping to reduce the regularity and severity of extreme weather and flooding events
- The plant will provide a safe and secure route for locally produced manures which are currently stored in open tanks, on pads and spread raw on fields – improving both air and water quality
- The plant will pay local Business Rates – which in turn will support local services
As part of the new application, we are proposing the delivery of 2 digestate lagoons instead of the 3 proposed on planning portal. The reduction in digestate lagoons reflects the reduced feedstock level and subsequent reduced need for digestate storage. The 2 digestate lagoons will hold approximately 5,000m3of liquid digestate each, and both will be fully enclosed, covered and lined.
The lagoons are located away from the plant, located either in or close to the fields where the digestate can be spread directly to land. This way we can pump the digestate straight from the AD plant to the fields where it will be used and avoid transporting the digestate in tankers on the roads. At present, all the chemical fertilisers and manures used in the local area are transported to the fields by heavy goods vehicles on roads. Where digestate is needed further away, we have proposed some offtake connections where the farmers can connect their tankers (off the road) and take the digestate back to their farms to use.
One lagoon is located to the north-east of the AD Plant (off Common Road); and the other is next to the farmyard south of the Oaks, where Des (our Farmer) lives.
We have deliberately chosen locations as far away from dwellings and occupied buildings as possible, out of flood zones, but still on fields where the digestate can be used directly.
Both lagoons will have hedging around them, as well as secure fencing to prevent people inadvertently accessing the lagoons. The lagoons offer a far greater level of security than the various open field ponds in the area, which have no such security or safety measures.
The digestate that will be pumped to both lagoons will be ‘post-treatment’, and therefore not ‘active.’ All digestate is pasteurised after the AD process to kill weed seeds and any remaining microbes – it is the breakdown of biological material by microbes that produces odour compounds, therefore the digestate will have a minimal odour. To further minimise any potential odour from the lagoons, both will be covered, lined and sealed at all times.
The flare is a safety feature that is only used in the extremely rare event of plant shutdown. Safety Systems have to be tested weekly with a 30-second test to confirm the operability of the system – this short test will burn 0.0025% of the biomethane produced at the site. The flare is contained in a cylinder, so it will not be seen by surrounding residences.
Operations onsite will be between 0730 and 1800 Monday to Sunday – though the actual feeding of the hoppers will only occur for approximately 4-5 hours each day within these hours. During harvest, the plant may receive crops for “clamping” between 0700 in the morning and up to 2200 hours in the evening, as Deal Farm does currently and as is standard practice for farmers all over the country.
The production of biogas within the tanks and injection to the gas main is 24/7, but this will not impact surrounding residents at all.
No – the site will have lighting but it will be on motion sensor only. Since normal operations only take place during the day, the site will be in darkness at night unless there is a fault requiring repair – in which case only that small area of the site in use will be lit.
