Adapting waste-to-energy interventions for seasonal demand

This case study examines how Elgin Fruit Juice in South Africa addressed seasonal energy demand imbalances by transitioning from a planned grid-feed electricity model to using biogas as a coal replacement in steam boilers.

• Elgin Fruit Juice installed an anaerobic digester that processes 30t of wet pomace, 7200t of waste fruit, and 600t of biomass from nearby farms to produce 527 kW of electricity and 650 kW of thermal energy via a combined heat and power (CHP) unit.
• The anaerobic digester provides operational energy cost savings of 30-40% and reduces the demand on the service provider's grid, though low energy demand during the off-crop season (July to December) previously led to the flaring of gas.
• Due to delays in obtaining a generating license to sell excess electricity to Eskom, a new entity called Elgin Bio-digestion was formed to operate the plant and use excess biogas to supplement coal-based boilers, resulting in annual coal cost savings of R2.2 million.
• The project achieves significant environmental impacts, including a landfill waste reduction of 18,250 tonnes per annum and a carbon footprint reduction of 36,540 tonnes CO2e per annum through landfill diversion, plus approximately 2,600 tonnes CO2e through coal replacement.

APA

Salie, Y. (2020). Adapting waste-to-energy interventions for seasonal demand. GreenCape. https://greencape.co.za/assets/BIOGAS_CASE_STUDY_16_9_20.pdf

Chicago

Salie, Yaseen. Adapting waste-to-energy interventions for seasonal demand. GreenCape, 2020. https://greencape.co.za/assets/BIOGAS_CASE_STUDY_16_9_20.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Salie |first1=Yaseen |title=Adapting waste-to-energy interventions for seasonal demand |publisher=GreenCape |date=2020 |url=https://greencape.co.za/assets/BIOGAS_CASE_STUDY_16_9_20.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{salie2020adapting, author = {Salie, Yaseen}, title = {{Adapting waste-to-energy interventions for seasonal demand}}, institution = {GreenCape}, year = {2020}, url = {https://greencape.co.za/assets/BIOGAS_CASE_STUDY_16_9_20.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }