Bielefeld, 24th January 2012: The leading supplier of turnkey biogas plants, Biogas Nord (BGN), announces a new product - a guarantee that their clients will receive at least 88% of the maximum output of their plants.

This guarantee is backed by AXA, one of the leading German insurance companies. While biogas technology is relatively simple, the process of anaerobic digestion is a complicated and delicate one.

That is why the owners of biogas plants, especially those who are not farmers, often experience difficulties, low yields and therefore less than optimum incomes. Biogas Nord is now offering a product that solves this problem. The average efficiency of biogas plants built by BGN is about 95%, the highest rate in the industry. More than 350 proofs in 12 countries substantiate this claim. Therefore Biogas Nord trusts its biogas plants at an unprecedented level, and passes this confidence to its customers.

Alexander Rechter, CEO of Biogas Nord AG: 'This conviction is shared by AXA, one of the biggest insurance companies in Germany and worldwide. Our new product should be especially appealing to banks and other financial investors in biogas plants.' If a secured project does not produce at least 88% of the possible electrical power, Biogas Nord will reimburse the client for the lost performance.

This guarantee is offered as a part of Biogas Nord's Service & Maintenance offers, its biological supports and insurance-solutions, which cover also mechanical breakdowns and business interruptions. It is backed by Biogas Nord's 24/7 Service and Maintenance department, and the best biogas laboratory in Europe.

The Supervisory Board (Aufsichtsrat) of Biogas Nord AG (the Company), the leading supplier of turnkey biogas plants, has unanimously appointed Friedrich-Wilhelm Schwenker as a new member of the Executive Board (Vorstand) of the Company as of the 1st of January 2012.

Friedrich-Wilhelm Schwenker has served the Company since July 2009 as the Head of the Construction Department, and since January 2010 as the Chief Operating Officer. Mr. Schwenker will be responsible for the technical supervision, and will be joining on the Vorstand Mr. Alexander Rechter and Ms. Asnat Drouianov.

Alexander Rechter (CEO): "We are very happy that Mr. Schwenker has agreed to join the Vorstand. He is a qualified engineer with more than 20 years of experience in the different areas of construction, site and project management. Since he has joined Biogas Nord he has contributed significantly to the development of the Company, and we are sure that his nomination will positively influence Biogas Nord's future development. His hands-on mentality, as well as his whole personality, fit perfectly this position and the business environment in which the Company operates.”

Friedrich-Wilhelm Schwenker:  "I thank the Supervisory Board for the trust it has placed in me. Biogas is an exciting and challenging business, and I love it. I am looking forward to contributing my knowledge and professional experience in this responsible position towards helping the Company meet its new challenges."

Before Mr. Schwenker joined the Company he worked for Kampa Hausbau, Bisping Fenster und Fassadenbau, Bien-Zenker AG Fertighausbau and Betonbau GmbH, where he accumulated leadership, construction, technical and management skills in the responsible positions he held. He also gained extended knowledge and experience in operating and constructing biogas plants from his own plant, which he operates together with his brother since 2010.

Biogas Nord AG (the Company) is pleased to announce that Mr. Gerrit Holz, the former member of the Management Board (Vorstand) of the Company, has entered into an exclusive consulting agreement with the Company. The consultancy will focus on the development of new products for the Company, as well as on improving the efficiency of existing biogas plants, and is effective as of 30.11.2011.

Alexander Rechter, CEO of Biogas Nord: "Our plants are already the most efficient on the market, with an average efficiency of over 95%. Together with Mr. Holz we will continue to improve our products, and present the market with innovative solutions. "

New option for small-scale biogas

A new small-scale "turnkey" biogas plant was launched by technology provider Biogas Nord at this year's Dairy Event & Livestock show.

The 75kW BiNoMiniMax has been designed for small to medium-sized livestock farms and runs primarily on slurry or manure from cattle or pigs, plus some supplementary silage.

The company's Owen Yeatman said the single 678m3 digester, with 75kW combined heat and power unit, associated control systems and slurry tank, would cost around £500,000 to install, excluding grid connection. As a guide, it could run on the slurry and manure from 160 cows (around 3000-4000t), plus 900t of maize silage per year, or the slurry from 920 sows plus 900t of silage, he said.

Annual electricity savings for such a dairy unit - assuming 95% efficiency of the CHP system - would be around £20,000-30,000 and with heat used to warm cleaning water for the parlour, as well as the farmhouse, another £10,000 saving could possibly be added, he said. Combined with additional Feed-in Tariff income worth 14p/kWh and Renewable Heat Incentive payments of 6.5p/kWh, that would give a payback of around six years, he claimed.

"It's a simple design that doesn't need a large amount of extra land for the feedstock, as bigger systems do. The 900t of silage needed is only about 2.5t per day, much of which could come from waste silage off clamps, or rougher quality second- or third-cut."

Farmers would have the option to expand the system in the future by adding a second digester tank, he noted.

"A system such as this could run mainly on the farm waste with few extra substrates needed. Biogas plants do require more managing than things like solar or wind, but the returns can be potentially higher and aren't reliant on the weather. It could be useful way of getting a son or daughter involved in the business."

Boosting gas yields

The company also launched a new system for improving the biogas yield from woody or high lignin feedstocks, such as straw, grass, hay and manure. The BioNoLiquifeed hydrolysis unit uses a mix of bacteria to pre-treat feedstocks before they are fed into the digester.

The process reduces the dry matter content and converts the fibrous biomass into acetic acid in around three to five hours, depending on substrates. The pre-treated substrates are then pumped into the primary digester.

Mr Yeatman said the system, which costs around £150,000, could shorten retention times in the digester by up to 20 days and improved the biogas yield from fibrous substrates by 15-20%. It could also mean that other previously overlooked feedstocks, such as oilseed rape straw, could be used, he suggested.

Substrates are fed into the hydrolysis unit using a wheel loader, which reduces the need for more expensive and higher-maintenance slurry stores, walking floors and screw conveyors, he added.

Biogas plant makes the most of fuel from waste

Neil Gemmell, who farms at Clayton Hall Farm near Wakefield, has installed a 400kW anaerobic digestion plant, to process 6,000t of feedstock a year. Although the plant would be viable with energy crops from the farm, in energy terms, some 80% of the feedstock comes from food waste.

The large digester has a capacity of 2,800cu m, which is required for the long retention times that are a feature of the system supplied by Biogas Nord.

"The system is designed to run on less than 4kg of solid material per cubic metre per day," explains Biogas Nord's UK representative Owen Yeatman.

"Traditional British digesters are smaller, but the economics are driven by gate fees. We want to extract all the energy from whatever comes in. For example, with maize we would expect 90-95% breakdown of the material."

One advantage of the large digester is the amount of gas storage it provides, something that other installations use secondary digesters or separate gas stores to achieve.

To handle food waste, the plant needs to comply with animal by-products (ABP) legislation, which includes a requirement for an enclosed reception area. At Clayton Hall a redundant grain store was used, meaning that extra capital was required to comply with this aspect of the rules.

From the reception building, the solid material is augured into the digester where agitators keep the mixture moving for up to 60 days. A heating system incorporated inside the concrete walls maintains the temperature at 40-42C. Once the gas has been extracted, the digestate is sent to a pasteuriser, which is a key difference from most on-farm plants. The material is pumped through a macerator to ensure it is small enough to comply with the ABP rules and then pasteurised in batches at 72C for one hour.

In terms of cost, Mr Yeatman reckons that the need for pasteurisation increased the overall capital cost of the plant by as much as 10%. "There is also a significant operating cost in terms of monitoring and meeting statutory requirements," he adds.

The pasteurised digestate is currently stored in a lagoon, although the farm plans to install a separator to separate the liquid and solid fractions, which can then be marketed under the PAS110 standard for quality digestate.

Mr Gemmell is very happy with the system, but he warns other farmers thinking about developing a waste-fed biogas plant to think carefully. "It certainly comes with a whole raft of extra things on top," he says.

While the costs of the plant are confidential, Mr Yeatman says that a typical 500kW plant using farm-based inputs would be around £1.6m, excluding digestate storage. He estimates that once adding compliance with ABP regulations has been offset against the need not to construct a silage clamp for feedstock storage, the additional cost for a food waste plant of the same size would be around £200,000. Gate fees and gas output should increase the margins on the plant, but at higher management, regulatory and capital costs compared with plants based on farm inputs.

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Biogas Nord –Going Global !

Biogas Nord (BGN) held its shareholders’ meeting for 2011 and announced its new strategy.

“2010 was a very successful year for BGN. Its results give us the power to follow our long-term strategy of globalisation. There is an increasing international demand for German biogas technology. We are poised to satisfy it.” This was the summary of Alexander Rechter, the CEO of BGN, at the 2011 shareholders’ meeting, where he presented very encouraging figures. For the first time since 2007, and following three consecutive years of losses, BGN entered well into profit. The company achieved an EBITDA of TEUR 2,069, compared to a negative EBITDA of TEUR 389 in 2009 – an increase of almost TEUR 2,500 during 2010.

During 2010, the second consecutive year since its takeover by EBP (European Business Partners), also headed by Alexander Rechter, the annual turnover from projects reached almost Euro 56M. This was an increase of 53% from the Euro 37M in 2009, which followed an increase of 104% from the 2008 figure. The net earnings after taxes and minority interests were 957 TEUR, following a net loss of 642 TEUR during the previous year.the leading biogas entity there. The management has also started making initial contacts to re-enter the United States market.

As a technology leader, BGN strives to remain at the forefront of technological innovation, continuing to produce the most modern, state-of-the-art biogas plants. And, last but not least, the company adapts its products to suit an increasing number of substrates and applications.

More and more business entities, especially those handling waste, see biogas plants as the answer to their needs. Alexander Rechter: “In the past most of our customers were farmers, who saw the investment in a biogas plant as a source of additional income. Today, a growing number of industrialists, investment funds and other capital groups, as well as the banks which finance investments in biogas, view a biogas plant as a long-term investment in renewable energy. This latter group is less interested in the technology, and its primary concern is to minimise its risk by guaranteeing the return on its investment. To address this demand we have added to the range of our financial products a performance guarantee for biogas plants which ensures the customer a pre-agreed electrical yield, and therefore a guaranteed income.”

Alexander Rechter: “Our goal is to become a truly global turnkey biogas plant provider. We have already started activities to achieve this.” This strategy demands a totally different approach to marketing and selling plants, and, even more importantly, to overcoming the logistical problems of permitting and construction in locations far away from the company’s headquarters in Bielefeld. It also means finding strategic partners in countries which are too far to be controlled from Germany. In South Korea, the company has established a subsidiary together with a leading South Korean EPC provider. In Poland, BGN has entered into a long-term representation agreement with Biopower S.A.,

_{General amendments: Unless otherwise stated, all data as of 31st of December 2010. No liability assumed. For the complete financial statements and more information please visit www.biogas.de}

On Sunday, the 07.08.11 the opening of the new biogas plant in Feilitzsch/Hof took place. Lots of visitors attented the event to take a look at the new biogas plant, built by BGN. Despite the bad weather at the end of the year, the plant was completed in time and the compensation for electricity fed into the grid was secured. Together with the owner Mr. Frank Hick, BGNs project manager Werner Stockmann gave information about biogas-process and the operation of a plant and explained the audience the role of biogas for our future energy supply.

Ehepaar Hick vor der Anlage

On the 8^th of July, iEnergy AG, located in Zug (Switzerland), offered all Biogas Nord AG ("the Company") shareholders a voluntary and public exchange of their shares through the electronic Bundesanzeiger.

All the Company's shareholders were offered the possibility to exchange one Biogas Nord AG share for one share of Smart Grids AG, which is located in Berlin (Germany). The offer is limited to 1.100.000 shares of Smart Grids AG.

The members of the Supervisory Board of the Company, as well as the Supervisory Board of the Company, knew nothing about the existence of iEnergy AG or Smart Grid AG before the exchange offer was made, nor had any kind of relationship with them. Furthermore, Biogas Nord AG was not informed about the exchange offer in advance.

Based on the information published on 15. June 2011, on the webpage of www.finanzen.net,

” Die Tauschmasche
Nepper versuchen über einen Tausch an werthaltige Aktien oder Fondsanteile zu kommen. Als Köder genügt eine Anzeige im elektronischen Bundesanzeiger. Die kostet gut 30 Euro. Dann geht alles automatisch. Denn die Banken verpflichten sich, alle Offerten an die Depotinhaber weiterzuleiten. Bei der Targo Bank heißt es etwa, man werde „insbesondere Informationen über freiwillige Kauf- und Umtauschangebote zur Kenntnis geben.“ So sparen sich die Abzocker auch noch das Porto.

Derzeit besonders beliebt sind Tauschangebote für Offene Immobilienfonds, die klamm sind und die Anteilsrücknahme ausgesetzt haben. Dabei nutzen die gewieften Bauernfänger eine Gesetzeslücke. Denn solange das Volumen der zum Tausch angebotenen Wertpapiere nicht die Grenze von 100 000 Euro überschreitet, fallen die entsprechenden Umtauschangebote nicht unter die Prospektpflicht nach dem Wertpapierprospektgesetz, erläutert Marcus ­Assion von der Bafin.

Die Masche wird offenbar von immer denselben Personen mit wechselnden Gesellschaftsnamen wie GES Beteiligungen, WRH Consulting (beide Heidenheim) oder SPV Co KG aA (Gerstetten) abgezogen. So versuchte zuletzt die GES Anlegern Anteile am SEB Immoinvest abzu­schwatzen.

Auch Aktionäre der Solar Millennium AG erhielten wiederholt ein Tauschangebot von ihrer Bank. Bis zum 31. Mai konnten sie eine Solar-Mil­lennium-Aktie in 2,5 Anteilscheine der Berliner Smart Grids AG tauschen. Hinter dem Deal steckt die Beteiligungsgesellschaft iEnergy aus der Schweiz, die Muttergesellschaft von Smart Grids. Das Brisante daran: Während Solar Millennium (SM) ein funktionierendes Geschäftsmodell nachweisen kann, fängt die Smart Grids AG, die aus dem Börsenmantel der BRG Vermögensverwaltung hervorgegangen ist, mit dem Geschäftsmodell erneuerbare Energien erst an. Zudem ist bei SM deutlich mehr Handelsvolumen als bei den Papieren der Smart Grids AG.

Interessant auch: Verschiedene Verantwortliche der Smart Grids AG und iEnergy stammen aus dem Umfeld der Grüezi Invest AG, deren börsennotierte Tochter Grüezi Real Estate zum Pennystock verkommen ist. So ist deren früherer Vorstandschef Roland Döbele laut dem Schweizer Wirtschaftsauskunftsdienst Moneyhouse zugleich Verwaltungsrat der iEnergy und der Grüezi Invest. Auch iEnergy-Direktor Roland Bacon ist bei der Grüezi Invest als Zeichnungsberechtigter aktiv, Smart-Grids-Aufsichtsrat Ulrich Alexander Setzermann wiederum war beim Börsengang der Grüezi Real Estate mit an Bord. Alte Bekannte also.."

read the whole article here:

http://www.finanzen.net/eurams/bericht/Vorsicht_Abzocke__181302

the Supervisory Board  of Biogas Nord AG, including all the Board members, are calling  all the shareholders' attention to the above information, and are asking them to  check the offer carefully. Based on that information,  should the shareholders accept the offer, they might be putting their investment into a grave risk. Consequently, the Supervisory Board, including all the Board members, advise the shareholders against accepting the offer.

We refer all the Company's shareholders to the publication on the 19^th of December, 2008 in the Bundesanstalt für Finanzdienstleistungsaufsicht (BaFin) where all shareholders were recommended to check the seller very carefully, as well as the economic substance of the offer, and to request further information, if necessary.

Furthermore, the Company has informed BAFIN and the Frankfurt Stock Exchange of the above offer, and provided them with information enabling them to further investigate the  possibilities of any  illegal actions involved in such an offer.

The full BaFin article can be found on:

http://www.bafin.de/cln_179/nn_722552/SharedDocs/Mitteilungen/DE/Verbraucher/VM__Weitere/vm__081219__umtauschangebote.html?__nnn=true