HybridBioEnergies: Development of an innovative hybrid renewable energy plant based on a combination of biomass and solar energy and development of profound knowledge as precondition for application in Egypt and Morocco

The overall objective of the project is to set-up a sustainable basis for a joint research on hybrid bioenergy systems with focus on biomass and solar heat and their future application in form of a solar heated biogas plants in the Mediterranean Region. This will be achieved by collaboration of German, Egyptian and Moroccan researchers framed by close participation of public and private stakeholders (ministries, research program owners, financing sector, SMEs, farms and rural communities). The addressed issue is the development of a biogas plant using solar heat. This hybrid technology is unique, innovative and particularly suitable for the Mediterranean Region. As decentralized technology it will offer new chances in particular for rural areas. Research issue of the project will be to analyze the potential of combining energy production from biomass and solar in a hybrid biogas-solar heat plant in the Mediterranean region and to develop convertible concepts for their further construction and application in the partner countries, which are in detail: • Hybrid system development by adaption of state-of-the-art solarthermics to the needs of a biogas plant to realize a constant temperature in the fermenter by considering different biogas plant concepts • Adaption of the state-of-the-art biogas technology approved in Germany to the needs, climatic conditions and framework in the Mediterranean countries by considering also the co-fermentation of the different organic industrial/agricultural waste and residuals and waste water streams • Adhesive behavior of bacterial methanogens on the various materials • Determination of interfacial factors in the early stage of biofilm formation and their stability in relation to the performance in the fermenter • Pretreatment of available biomass • Development of concepts to use the surplus heat • Development of an intelligent system to optimize supply and demand based on energy management