ETW commissions first biomethane plant in Italy

ETW Energietechnik GmbH, based in Germany, has built a biomethane plant in southern Italy in collaboration with Ranieri Tonissi of Genoa, Italy.

The plant in the Taranto, Apulia region has a capacity of 4,400 standard cubic meters of landfill gas per hour and uses an ETW SmartCycle PSA biogas upgrading system and a downstream nitrogen reduction unit (NRU).

ETW’s general contractor scope of supply includes raw gas conditioning, lean gas aftertreatment with regenerative thermal oxidation (RTO), gas flaring and biomethane feed-in with postcompression to 25 bar.

“With the ETW treatment process with NRU, which was specially developed for landfill gas, landfill gas with nitrogen contents of over 20 percent can be treated to produce biomethane that can be fed into the grid,” says Alexander Szabo, a sales manager at ETW Energietechnik.

The plant in Taranto has been producing biomethane since its commissioning in August 2024.

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“The methane recovery from the landfill gas is a very good value of over 95 percent,” Szabo adds.

The facility consists of six standardized containers, set up in a U-shape with a large covered interior for the PPE technology and NRU. The facility was erected in a construction period of about four months, according to the company.

ETW, a manufacturer of highly flexible gas-fired power plants, has been developing and producing energy systems at its Moers site since 1997. Its core business focuses on the construction and servicing of biomethane plants for upgrading biogas to natural gas using the ETW SmartCycle PSA process and upgrading to liquid carbon dioxide (CO₂) using the ETW SmartCool CO₂ liquefaction system.

ETW services large energy suppliers, agricultural businesses, local authorities and industrial companies.