From 2025, BMW Group Plant Dingolfing will use heat produced from regional biomass and its own waste wood to meet approximately 50 percent of the process hot water needs. To this end, the company signs a supply contract for just under 100.000 MWh of thermal energy per year with UP Energiewerke GmbH, a joint subsidiary of the public works department Stadtwerke Dingolfing and Bayernwerk Natur. This saves BMW Group Plant Dingolfing approximately 20.000 tons of CO2 per year, compared to the use of conventional fossil energy.
“This agreement is an important part of our future energy mix. It will make us more regional, sustainable and resilient. In addition to green energy, green heat will also be the key to continuing to improve our ecological footprint,” says plant director Christoph Schröder. “By using biomass as a renewable energy source and with this supply contract for locally produced heat, we can reduce our total CO2 emissions by approximately 10 to 15 percent per year compared to current levels.”
Energy supply must start no later than the second quarter of 2025. The supply contract has a term of twenty years, with an agreed annual purchase volume of almost 100.000 MWh of thermal energy. The heat will be produced in a new biomass heating plant being built on an industrial road in Dingolfing, at a site in close proximity to the BMW Group car factory, between the Dynamics Center and the A92 motorway.
New biomass heating plant west of the BMW Group vehicle factory
The heating plant will have three boilers operating all year round, as well as its own pallet and waste wood chipper. UP Energiewerke GmbH will invest a total of approximately 35 million euros in this facility in the coming years. Underground pipes will transport the locally produced heat to the energy center of the BMW Group car plant, where it will be distributed across the site via the plant's internal network. Construction of the heating plant is scheduled to start at the end of 2023.
Wood and wood residues from regional forestry
About a quarter of the wood used as fuel will come from the BMW Group's own untreated waste wood – for example from disposable pallets and transport crates. However, the majority of the wood will come from regional forestry, i.e. from sustainably managed PEFC-certified forests within an average radius of 60 kilometers around Dingolfing. As with the existing heating plant in Dingolfing, Biomasse Vertrieb Ostbayern (BVO) GmbH is the partner for wood procurement, which is supported by local forest owners and the public works department of Dingolfing. The wood used as fuel is a byproduct of forestry and timber harvesting that cannot be used elsewhere. This is available in large quantities and was previously often exported abroad in the form of wood chips. By using wood chips from sustainable forestry, instead of fossil fuels,2 emissions, because the CO2 released during combustion during the growth and life phase of the plants is bound to the atmosphere.
Anton Heidobler, forestry engineer and director of BVO GmbH, explains: “Bavarian forestry will face enormous challenges in the coming years as climate change continues to progress. Largely coniferous forests must be converted into climate-stable mixed forests by planting more deciduous trees and changing tree species. Young trees should also be cared for in the early stages and mixed growth regulation should be promoted, in favor of climate-resilient tree species. For this reason alone, significant amounts of waste wood will be generated in the coming decades through both regular use and salvage wood, which can be recycled in a meaningful and economical way in the energy sector. With the new heating plant, we as consumers can keep value creation local. The use of regional biomass makes sense from an environmental point of view and ensures shorter transport and recycling distances. In the interest of sustainability, we naturally only include what can grow back in our forests every year.”
Source: BMW Group
