Certification Profile

With Directive 2009/28/EC (Renewable Energy Directive, RED), the European Commission has defined a framework in which liquid biomass used for the generation of energy can be considered sustainably produced and therefore subject to tax breaks, if applicable. By 5 December 2010, this Directive must be transformed into national law by the European member states.

Biokraft-NachV

Germany reacted very quickly to this and published the first ordinance in July, 2009, already: the Biomass-Electricity-Sustainability-Ordinance (BioSt-NachV), which governs the generation of electrical power from liquid biomass.

In September 2009, there followed the Ordinance on Requirements Pertaining to Sustainable Production of Biofuels (Biokraft-NachV), which governs the use of biological combustibles in fuels. Both ordinance focus primarily on vegetable oils to be used for heating or power generation. Implementation of these legal requirements has been delegated to the German BLE (Federal Agency for Agriculture and Food), which for this purpose recognizes and monitors certification systems and bodies.
According to para 46 of the German EEG, operators of biogas plants are obliged to notify the network operator about their input materials (solid biomass, liquid biomass, other biomass), as well as the technologies used. The operators of biogas plants are required to supply the data necessary for final settlement by 28 February of each year for the previous year.