Jamal O. Jaber Faculty of Engineering, Philadelphia University, Amman, Jordan, on sabbatical leave from the Faculty of Engineering Technology, Al-Balqa’ Applied University, Jordan JERA Center Workshop Amman - Jordan 30 October 2014

 Technical and market potential exists  The contribution of such resource in the national energy mix is still minor

 For the long-term future, ensuring the security of energy supplies is a highly important issue  Renewable energy is considered the largest domestic energy source together with oil shale

 Solar (Jordan has abundant supplies of solar energy, with relatively high average daily solar radiation of 5.5 kWh m2 day) and sunshine duration is around 2900 hours, which can be considered sufficient to provide enough energy for solar heating/cooling applications

 Wind Energy: Strong wind regime (annual average wind speed exceeds 6m/s at 10m height).  A wind atlas exists for Jordan since  Two pilot wind farms : -4x80 kW at Al-Ibrhymia, x225kW at Hofa, 1996  Water pumping using mechanical wind turbines

 Geothermal: Very limited geothermal resources due to the low enthalpy not allowing for commercially viable electric power generation.

 Hydro Power: Limited hydro power resources due to the fact of surface water resources being almost negligible  There is some potential for mini-hydro systems and the Red-Dead canal

 Biomass energy includes all fuels derived from biological sources, such as charcoal, agricultural, animal and municipal wastes  Energy from biomass in Jordan has, as yet, achieved little significance and only appears to offer a low potential because of the severe constraints on vegetation growth imposed by the arid climate

 solid wastes in Jordan represent an energy potential of about 10 5 toe annually, but municipal solid waste represents a major fraction with a gross annual production rate of more than 3 million toe  The daily average per capita varies between 0.35 kg and 0.95 kg in rural and urban regions, respectively, of municipal solid waste, and the typical gross calorific value is between 7 and 11 MJ/kg

 A pilot project (3 MW) on the utilization of municipal solid waste for electricity generation through landfill and biogas technology systems  At present, there is a plan to utilize other landfill sites  Kettle and poultry farms have good potential

 Integrated Waste Recycling Systems for Agricultural and Environmental Safety Purposes in Rural Communities (NERC)  Specific Objectives: 1. To design, build and operate bio-digester demonstration pilot plant (D-PP) in a rural village in the north of Jordan. 2. To examine the effectiveness and safety of using the products of the process, the biogas and the compost, and the contribution to the economy of the family household and of the local agriculture (including examination / demonstration of household appliances operated on biogas).

 Digester size about 16 m 3 included the dome and operation of electrical mixer using the photovoltaic panels.

 The digester was successfully implemented by using concrete, iron, bricks, and it consists of four layers, the inner layer is bricks, the second layer is double face of rock wool, the third layer is cement with iron rods and the fourth layer is bricks, the concrete dome was implemented in the digester for collecting the biogas yield. Solar collector was used to feed-in the digester with warm temperature around 40 C, to increase the biogas yield within shortage period.

OBJECTIVES To demonstrate the biogas technology in a highly populated animal farms areas like AL-Khaeledia region/Mafraq Governorate, and Al-Dleel region in Zarqa Governorate. These two regions have at least 69 % of total dairy farms in Jordan, please see table below. At least cows were breeded in 143 dairy farms in these two regions. The massive organic waste produced by these dairy farms is estimated by 644 tons every day. The major part of manure is either disposed in landfills or randomly disposed in near communities

The most important weaknesses that may hinder efforts in developing Bio-Energy and other renewable energy sources in Jordan are:  the available financing schemes  the low level of awareness  the future price of energy (electricity) generated by renewable sources.

 It is still uncommon, in Jordan, to find banks’ that have special financing programs, with reduced service charges, to support RE and EE projects, despite the credit-line (special loan) offered by the French Agency for Development (AFD)  JREEEF was created by the REEEL as an operating unit within MEMR to contribute to the development of renewable energy and energy efficiency in Jordan. However, it is still not operational, yet.

 The lack of awareness on the importance and potential of bio-energy, not only among government officials, but also among scientist, researchers, NGO and the general public is delaying the fast penetration of the technology  Generating awareness on the necessity of renewable energy on all levels is considered as the main driver for prioritizing renewable energy in energy policies and plans.

The existing problems related to bio-energy (RE ) market in Jordan could be grouped into four main clusters as follows:  Lack of incentives and financial resources to support RE projects.  Lack of know-how of RE technologies and inefficient management of RE affairs.  Lack of political well and inefficient implementation of RE regulations.  Lack of applied research and inadequate study and training curricula related to RE sources and technologies.

To overcome the above listed problems, the concerned ministries and public institutions should be committed to a non-reversible path and vision for renewable targets, and does so by adopting the following key principles:  A commitment to a phased approach involving an investment program that exploits the cost and technical potential of each RE technology option.  Removal of obstacles and facilitation of on-going projects as a matter of urgency and concomitant strengthening of public institutions.  Developing a national RE master plan with stakeholder buy-in engaging with the rural communities as a key cornerstone of the renewable energy program.  Picking the lowest hanging fruit with the immediate launch of projects that eat away at the peak demand, including distributed energy projects that can yield immediate employment opportunities.  Encouraging technological innovation.

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