Europe’s Commitment to the Biogas and Biomethane Value Chain

by Angela Sainz (Innovation News) Biogas and biomethane industries are providing today the cheapest and most scalable renewable gas made in Europe. -- The biogas and biomethane industries are ready and fully committed to scale up the sector and produce at least 35 billion cubic metres (bcm) of biomethane by 2030.

“These industries are providing today the cheapest and most scalable renewable gas produced in Europe,” stressed Harmen Dekker, CEO of the European Biogas Association (EBA), during the closing ceremony of the European Biogas Conference held in October 2021 in Brussels.

Outcomes from the European Biogas Conference 2022

The 2022 event was sold out for the second time in a row. This edition was a platform for insightful discussions on how to scale-up the sector, based on the thought-provoking interventions of over 50 high-level speakers, including the Commissioner for Agriculture, Janusz Wojciechowski; the Head of Cabinet of the Commission’s Executive Vice-President, Diederik Samsom; the Deputy Director for DG Energy, Metchild Wörsdörfer; and the International Energy Agency (IEA).

Over 350 delegates, including policymakers, academia, industry representatives, and civil society organisations, enjoyed a two-day intensive programme addressing critical bottlenecks and opportunities for the sector. A key topic on the agenda was the sustainable achievement of the 35 bcm yearly biomethane production target by 2030. During his participation in one of the panels, Samsom urged the industry to be bolder and speak louder about the benefits, projects, and investments of the sector because Europe needs more sustainable biomethane and larger scale projects by 2030.

Giulia Cancian, EBA’s Secretary General, said: “The two-day conference was marked by an extraordinary level of commitment from the biogas and biomethane value chain to achieve the REPowerEU target for biomethane (35 bcm a year by 2030) and to do so sustainably. Landing the right policy framework at EU level remains paramount to support the growth of our sector. Achieving a market design fit for renewable gases, promoting a tech-neutral framework to green transport, closing the nutrient loop and fostering healthy soils, ensuring the roll out of biomethane capacity and untapping the potential of sustainable feedstocks are necessary steps towards climate neutrality.’’

First steps of the Biomethane Industrial Partnership

During the first day of the conference, Commissioner Wojciechowski announced the technical launch of the Biomethane Industrial Partnership (BIP). The initiative is aimed at supporting the achievement of the target to increase annual production and use of biomethane to 35 billion cubic meters by 2030. This is part of the REPowerEU package of urgent actions to mitigate the impact of rising energy prices, diversify gas supplies and accelerate the clean energy transition. Representatives involved in the BIP explained the setup of the five Task Forces that will steer the work of this partnership in the coming months.

The BIP was officially launched in September, during the European Sustainable Energy Week (EUSEW), by the European Commission’s Executive Vice-President, Frans Timmermans, and the Commissioner for Energy, Kadri Simson. The partnership will be “instrumental in ensuring an increase on annual production and use of biomethane to 35 billion cubic meters (bcm) by 2030”, recalled Vice President Timmermans. Meanwhile, Commissioner Simson invited “all stakeholders to overcome barriers for growth, share best practices and foster collaboration to rapidly increase biomethane in production and use.”

The deployment of biomethane will reduce Europe’s dependency on natural gas from Russia, which provided 40% of the EU gas supplies before the Ukraine war. At the same time, it will substantially contribute to an integrated net-zero energy system, diversifying farmers’ incomes and ensuring a circular approach. The potential to reach 35 bcm is already there, using feedstocks that do not displace food production or land use.

A domestic and mature renewable energy source

Europe has been producing biogas domestically for over 50 years, and the homegrown technologies for a rapid scale-up are fully mature. Today, the biogas and biomethane industries are feeding Europe’s energy supplies with 18 bcm of renewable gas coming from almost 20,000 local plants. This is similar to the entire natural gas consumption of Belgium, home to 11.5 million citizens and is saving 60Mt of CO₂ equivalent, comparable to the amount of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions produced by Sweden annually.

By 2030, the deployment of 35 bcm of biomethane in Europe will represent a substantial part of the EU gas demand, considering lower projected consumption thanks to diversification and energy savings. By 2050, the sector has the potential to produce up to 167 bcm of sustainable biomethane. The latest data from the European Biogas Association (EBA), to be released in the upcoming EBA Statistical Report 2022 at the end of November, shows that biomethane will be able to cover 35-62% of gas demand by 2050, assuming a reduced gas demand in 2050 of 271 bcm.

The potentials for 2030 can be reached by using waste from the food and farming sectors, as well as from municipal and industrial streams and sequential crops. 2050 estimates allocate significant potential to gasification technologies. With this full potential untapped, the biogas and biomethane sectors combined will create no less than 420,000 green jobs by 2030 and over one million jobs by 2050, according to EBA figures. READ MORE