Status and Opportunities of Biogas Power Plants in Thailand and a Case Study

Abstract

Energy crisis and environmental pollution problems have drawn attention to increase renewable energy resource utilization and replace fossil fuels worldwide. For several decades, Thailand relies on fossil fuels in electricity generation and so on. The Ministry of Energy, Thailand complied the Development of Energy Plans to Thailand Integrated Energy Blueprint (TIEB) in 2020 for sustainable energy development in addition to overcome environmental problems. This case study shows energy recovery from wastes for self-sustain biogas power plants from chicken meat production. The onsite biogas power plant targets at a capacity of 1.5 MW at 24 h for every workday. The chicken manure can yield a biogas output of 128–134 m3/ton with the rate of electricity per biogas at 2.10 kWh/m3. Based on the project period for 15 years, the payback period, net present value (NPV), and internal rate of return (IRR) are 8.2 years, about 1,705,000 USD, and 8.86%, respectively. In general, the crucial success factor of biogas power plant installation mainly goes to concrete collaboration among the government and private sectors.