Economic Analyses of Utilization of Biomethane in Turkey

Abstract

Biomethane is a globally flourishing, renewable, and sustainable fuel and is considered to have the potential to be a promising solution in the future because of its benefits in terms of waste management, carbon reduction potential, and cost competitiveness. The study analyzes to determine the economical feasibility conditions of a prospective biomethane facility for Turkey as well as the carbon reduction potential of the facility. Because the raw material to produce biomethane is biogas, the study analyses the main determinants of the total cost of biogas firms producing electricity. Our findings include (1) repair maintenance costs, labor force costs, and raw material cost are the main determinants of the total cost of the firms. In addition, biogas production cost value is calculated hypothetically to utilize in the hypothetic biomethane facility as raw material as a cost component. The feasibility analysis of the hypothetic facility compares different biomethane production technologies on different scales. It is resulted that the unique feasible technology is the Pressurized Water Scrubbing method. Moreover, Hotspot fields are produced for biogas potential for layer chicken manure and cattle manure to suggest a province for the potential biomethane facility. In this respect, Çorum and Kars are considered as favorable places. Lastly, it is concluded that the mentioned biomethane facility production would cause 81,952 tons yearly net carbon savings which is equal to $15,161,094 social benefits yearly.