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Press release
- 25.01.2010
- Hamburg Airport now uses biogas supplied by E.ON Hanse Vertrieb and has enlarged its fleet of CNG vehicles with two new Solaris buses
They are 12 metres long, offer ample space for more than 80 passengers and their jour-neys are particularly eco-friendly and quiet: two new Solaris low-floor buses have joined the passenger transport fleet at Hamburg Airport. They are of the Solaris Urbino CNG type and are easy to spot even at a distance thanks to the large bulge on their roofs, which covers six compressed natural gas cylinders. Each cylinder has a volume of 214 litres, resulting in a total capacity of 1,284 litres. The buses are fuelled at the airport’s own CNG fuel station, which no longer uses conventional natural gas but has just been switched to 100% biogas supplied by E.ON Hanse. Certified by TÜV Nord, the biogas is produced entirely from renewable sources.
Claus-Dieter Wehr, Managing Director at Hamburg Airport: “We are very proud to be the first major customer of E.ON Hanse to use 100% biogas for its fleet. Compared with con-ventional petrol-fuelled vehicles, the CO2 emissions of a vehicle using 100% biogas are about 65% lower. We have been leading in innovation with compressed natural gas since 2005. We developed the first prototype of a CNG-powered baggage tractor. Today, all of our baggage tractors are CNG-fuelled – a fleet of 32 units. With the two new Solaris buses, our fleet of CNG vehicles reaches a total of 45. They are used in diverse parts of our operation: for airport security, maintenance, the airport fire brigade and of course for our environmental services.” Wehr further said, “With all our measures aimed at protect-ing climate and environment, including the use of alternative energies and the introduc-tion of emission-based start and landing fees, we offer a key contribution to making Hamburg an exemplary European Green Capital in 2011. This will also allow us to use the tile of European Green Capital Airport in 2011.”
Solaris CNG Buses
The two new Solaris buses for Hamburg Airport are fitted with luggage racks and pedes-tals, allowing passengers to comfortably store even large items of luggage. A screen shows flight number and destination. Furthermore, the buses have a ‘kneeling’ function to reduce the entrance height and they are fitted with manual wheelchair ramps. They cost about 245,500 Euro each. Based near Pozna, Solaris Bus & Coach has significant ex-perience in building buses for airport use. As early as 1999, a comfortable midibus was produced for Warsaw airport, where it continues to be used as a VIP shuttle. Today, So-laris buses are used at numerous European airports.
Jens Ludwigkeit, Regional Manager North at Solaris Deutschland, said: “With these new biogas-powered Solaris Urbino, Hamburg Airport not only has some of the most modern buses in Europe but is also leading in eco-friendliness. Solaris is proud to deliver this con-tribution to sustainable mobility in the 2011 European Green Capital. As one of Europe’s leading bus manufacturers we are delighted to demonstrate our expertise in Hamburg.”
Biogas supplied by E.ON Hanse Vertrieb
Roman Kaak, Managing Director of E.ON Hanse Vertrieb GmbH: “From this year on, bio-gas is a fixed part of the product offer of E.ON Hanse Vertrieb GmbH. We offer this both to corporate and individual customers. In our offer to individual customers, we guarantee a minimum 10% biogas. We are very happy that our long-standing customer Hamburg Airport values the advantages of this product. What’s special is that vehicles here will be fuelled with 100% biogas. This makes the supply of Hamburg Airport the biggest single order for E.ON Hanse Vetrieb GmbH in the entire city of Hamburg.”
For the production of biogas, specially cultured and grown plants are used. The harvested plants are hermetically sealed and fermented. This process produces biogas, which is composed mainly of methane gas (50-70%) and carbon dioxide (30-50%). Further parts are nitrogen, oxygen and hydrogen sulphide. A next processing step sees carbon dioxide, water and hydrogen sulphide removed. Further innovative processes result in refinement to biogas quality. In order to feed this biogas to the CNG distribution network, it is then compressed to operating pressure. The resulting biogas can be fed safely and reliably into the existing CNG network and is likewise transported and stored. E.ON Hanse Ver-trieb obtains its biogas from a biogas plant in Saxony-Anhalt.