Bright Biomethane
Bright Biomethane North America (Bright Biomethane) offers proven membrane biogas upgrading systems to upgrade biogas to renewable natural gas (RNG). Suitable for any existing or new biogas plant and having multiple applications, such as gas grid injection, bio-CNG or virtual pipeline.
Bright Biomethane is the daughter company of HoSt Bioenergy Systems, headquartered in the Netherlands and founded in 1991. HoSt is an international operating market leader of the full range of bioenergy systems: biogas plants, biomass-fired boiler installations, gasifiers, biogas upgrading, and maintenance service.
“We built our first plant nine years ago when Europe was moving from biogas for electricity production to RNG. Almost three years ago, we turned our sights to North America and formed a first partnership with Martin Energy Group for manufacturing in North America and providing a service team. This established a strong foothold and allows us to further strengthen our market presence”, says John Hawkes, representative of Bright Biomethane North America.
Bright Biomethane is a complete service provider with in-house engineering expertise, executing design, construction, installation, and maintenance. Most of the systems are containerized, also known as PurePacs, but Bright also has the capacity to construct systems indoors to accommodate cold climates, demonstrated by Bright Biomethane systems in Finland, Poland, and Sweden with the so-called PurePac Arctics.
To date, Bright Biomethane realized projects in 15 countries that range from small farm level of about 30 Nm3/hour ingoing biogas to larger projects of 2000 Nm3/hour at wastewater treatment plants. Bright Biomethane currently has 15 units running or in construction in the United States and is developing projects in Canada. “Expanding into Canada was a natural decision for Bright. In addition to our experience in colder climates, our analysis of the long-term future of biogas and impacts of federal policy and provincial gas utility RNG procurement plans is and has been very favourable” says John Hawkes.
Bright Biomethane offers well-proven PurePac biogas upgrading systems and indoor variations. Additionally, the CO2 that is removed from the biogas can be captured and recovered by means of liquefaction in Bright’s CO2-recovery system to produce food-grade quality CO2. The PurePac system is focused on energy efficiency and making the best use of heat recovery resulting in the highest heat recovery. As most of the systems are containerized and modular, the packages are consistent and cost-effective, also due to online, remote and automated monitoring and predictive maintenance. Bright Biomethane provides an integrated offering from design, manufacturing, on-site installation, commissioning, service and maintenance packages, and providing equity and financing opportunities in certain cases.
A notable Bright project is the Yellow Jacket project in New York State involving five farm biogas projects. It is a virtual pipeline system where one farm is connected to the grid and the other four have a virtual pipeline connection. The biogas is upgraded to RNG at each site and compressed to transport via truck to the central physical pipeline connection. John Hawkes, Bright Biomethane’s North American representative, will be providing more detail on this project at the 2021 Value of Biogas April Conference on April 27th.
Bright Biomethane joined the Canadian Biogas Association (CBA) as members in October 2020. They joined because the CBA is a good connection between the public and private sector and advocates for policy to help biogas development. John: “We recognize that the CBA has established credibility over 13 years with a consistent approach to advocacy and demonstrated a good ability to move with the times and changes in the market”.
