BMW will use biogas

© BMWOver 60 thousand examples of the 3 series are produced annually in South Africa, but none of them is or will be powered with biogas. Not directly at least

The matter is actually quite a stinky one, as BMW has announced plans to use electricity generated from, well... manure. This way the Rosslyn, South Africa, plant will become much greener in an effort to not only make cars, but also factories manufacturing cars easier on the environment. Interested in some "saucy" details? We have them!

The company has made a commitment to use all sorts of renewable energy in its facilities around the world, with actual sources of that energy depending on availability from country to country. In South Africa BMW has signed a ten-year contract with Bio2Watt to receive 4,4 megawatts of electric power from a biogas plant located nearby – some 50 miles (80 km) away from the factory in north-west Pretoria.

When the biogas plant reaches its full production capacity, it will provide the BMW factory with 25-30% of all the electricity it requires for its day to day operation. That's in no small part thanks to 30 thousand examples of cattle grazing in the area. And as cows graze, they obviously produce dung, which together with organic waste such as discarded dog food or yoghurt gone bad is used to produce biomethane. Apart from biogas, the Rosslyn plant (BMW's first foreign factory ever, opened in 1973) plans to use solar energy in the future as well, but that's another story...