Biogas and biomethane. How does it work and what can we gain?
Biogas represents a real opportunity for the development of our “local communities” and an energy breakthrough. More and more farms and municipalities in Poland are starting to invest in agricultural biogas plants – installations that bring profits to farmers, tax revenues to local governments, and cheaper heat to residents.
The technology has been in common use for decades, and installations producing biogas are counted in thousands.
Now it's time for Poland, because with the enormous potential of domestic agriculture, we can become one of the leaders in this field. We explain how biogas and biomethane differ from each other and why it's worth talking about them right now?
Imagine farms that are self-sufficient, fields where instead of slurry and manure, they are fertilized with processed odorless fertilizer, and the product made from biogas, which comes from local sources supplied by farmers, is exported throughout the country and beyond. But that’s not all.
Cleaner air for every resident and visitor
A biomethane production plant in your area means an end to spreading slurry and manure on fields. Farmers gain modern, odorless fertilizer.
New workplace in the municipality
A biogas plant means new jobs and a stable source of taxes in the municipality that can be used for investment in its development.
Profits for local suppliers and recipients
Investing in biogas creates opportunities for selling substrates, receiving fertilizer (digestate) and heat, providing transport services and others for the needs of the new plant.
Thanks to the biogas plant, residents have access to cheap heating energy, farmers supplying raw materials earn money, new jobs are created, and thanks to new taxes, local governments have additional funds for investments for residents.
Sounds like a futuristic vision? Not necessarily. Today, this is already happening in many municipalities, and farmers and residents who took advantage of the opportunity admit openly – we unnecessarily delayed the decision for too long.
So why biogas? The answer is very simple – because it pays off for everyone! Not taking advantage of such an opportunity would be a proverbial sin of neglect. Especially today – in times of rising energy and fuel prices, and ultimately the fight for energy security.
Biogas - another revolution is knocking at our door
For many, however, it's still a new topic that raises concerns.
This is natural, as it happens with every evolution that leads to development. Human history is a story of great breakthroughs and discoveries that changed our lives. Each industrial revolution brought major changes but also fear of the unknown.
When the era of steam engines arrived and trains appeared on tracks, people were initially afraid to board them. Soon the world accelerated even more, electrical energy was harnessed, and light bulbs replaced traditional candles in homes. In the second half of the previous century, we received computers that found their way into offices, schools, and every household.
Along with racing progress, as we now have a digital world and artificial intelligence, we are also looking for new opportunities to increase efficiency and utilize what we already have around us as raw materials or fuels.
Biogas is also becoming a great opportunity for this epochal change.
Thanks to it, we can replace gas imported from wealthy countries with our own biomethane – produced locally from our raw materials. The profits from its production will stay in our local economy and partly in our pockets
Once the steam engine transformed manufactories, today biogas plants can revolutionize Polish agriculture and we shouldn’t fear this. Why? We explain below.
What is biogas and how is it produced?
Biogas is a mixture mainly of methane and carbon dioxide produced through anaerobic fermentation of organic matter. The entire process takes place in an agricultural biogas plant, working on what... every farm has.
Biogas is produced from slurry and manure, crop residues (e.g., straw, silage, leaves), and leftover feed, vegetables, or fruits. The raw materials needed for biogas production (called substrates) go into special sealed tanks called fermenters. In this part of the technological process, the operating principle is simple – it’s based on natural processes similar to those occurring in silage or cow stomachs. Inside the tanks, without oxygen access, anaerobic bacteria break down organic matter, thus producing gas – mainly methane and carbon dioxide. This mixture is called biogas.
The term biogas plant is most commonly used when the produced biogas goes to a cogeneration unit, a device that produces electricity and heat. The generated electricity can be used on-site or sold to the grid. The thermal energy can be used to heat farm buildings, residential houses, as well as schools or other public facilities.
What's the difference between a biogas plant and a biomethane plant?
A biomethane plant is a very similar system, except that the produced biogas is predominantly purified in a way that allows obtaining essentially pure methane, called biomethane due to its origin. It is entirely organic methane that is considered a renewable source.
The biogas plant operation also produces digestate – a natural fertilizer that can be used on croplands. Importantly, it doesn’t emit odor and is better absorbed by plants than traditional manure. Biogas production also solves the increasingly common problem of managing excess slurry or manure, while eliminating the unpleasant odor associated with spreading it directly on fields.
Biogas in Poland. Time to catch up with Europe
According to Ministry of Agriculture analyses, up to 2 thousand agricultural biogas plants could be established in the country.
According to Ministry of Agriculture analyses, up to 2 thousand agricultural biogas plants could be established in the country. Today we have only 184, the rest are industrial and municipal installations (sewage sludge, municipal waste) and agricultural micro-installations. In total, over 400 facilities. In this respect, considering the potential of our agriculture, we are at the tail end of Europe, where according to estimates there are currently... about 18,000 biogas plants.
In Germany at the end of 2023, there were about 11 thousand biogas plants, including 10 thousand agricultural biogas plants (54 percent in Europe) and 258 biomethane plants (17 percent in Europe). Already in 2013, biogas plants in our western neighbors generated about 28 million MWh, which allowed powering over 7 million households with clean electricity. A decade later, it’s even more. In 2023, about 33 million MWh of electricity was produced from biogas in Germany. For comparison, in 2023, the country’s largest Bełchatów Power Plant generated 21.4 million MWh of electricity.
Other European countries also produce biogas. In France, over ten years (2013-2023), the number of agricultural biogas plants increased from 399 to 1,268 facilities. Additionally, this country is the leader in terms of operating biomethane plants (652). In Italy, there are about 1.8 thousand biogas plants in total, and in the United Kingdom over 1.2 thousand. Our southern neighbors are also ahead of us – in the Czech Republic, which is four times smaller than Poland, there are more than twice as many, namely 417 agricultural biogas plants.
Poland has the potential to catch up with Europe's leaders.
According to the Polish Biomethane Organization, the agri-food sector plays a key role in renewable energy development, offering huge amounts of so-called substrate counted in millions of tons for biogas production. Estimates for 2022 indicate that farms produced as much as 111 million tons of manure, 17 million tons of slurry, 37.2 million tons of straw, and 15 million tons of poultry droppings.
Experts point to the minimal utilization of these quantities. Currently, only 0.1 percent of manure potential, 5.4 percent of slurry, and just 0.3 percent of poultry droppings are used for biogas production. The rest is mostly regularly spread on fields, when it could be used to create a biomethane production plant, generating revenues similar to or sometimes exceeding the revenues of the entire municipality where such a plant is built. It’s worth noting that a significant portion will remain with local suppliers, service providers, in employee wages, and taxes that the municipality can annually invest in improving conditions for its residents.
It is estimated that from the available substrates, 28.3 billion m3 of biogas could be produced, which could be processed into 15.6 billion m3 of biomethane, however, currently it is technically possible to produce about 8.5 billion m3 of biomethane.
Biogas is an opportunity for municipalities. Mayor: we saw how it works and that convinced us!
More and more local governments are becoming convinced that biogas and Polish agriculture are destined for each other, and mayors, councilors, and farmers are seizing the opportunity, starting a revolution in their "local communities". More biogas plants are being built across Poland, and there's a chance for much more! The potential is enormous, for the construction of even several thousand such installations.
In May 2023, the first biogas plant in the Chełm district was opened in Turowiec (Lubelskie Voivodeship). The installation produces 8.2 thousand MWh of electricity annually. That’s as much as about 4,000 households use annually.
Henryk Gołębiowski, mayor of Wojsławice municipality, doesn’t hide his satisfaction with the investment, because as he emphasizes, there are huge benefits for both the local government and surrounding farmers.
Mayor of Wojsławice municipality
Were residents concerned about the investment?
The mayor admits that all doubts about unpleasant odors, for example, were resolved by a visit to an already operating biogas plant, where the investor took them on a tour.
“Together with councilors, village leaders, and farmers, we went on a trip to see how this installation works. We became convinced that these solutions are modern. We decided that there is no such risk that it would disturb residents. The visit convinced us – says Henryk Gołębiowski. – Today the installation is functioning and we are satisfied. This is ecology, farmers earn from sales, and the municipality has income – he adds.”
The mayor admits that he also convinces other local government officials who visit his municipality about such an investment.
“Local governments from around the country come to us to see how it looks. They ask me about it, and I think it was a very good decision – says Henryk Gołębiowski.”
The mayor of Zalewo municipality in the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship is also enthusiastic about biogas plants.
In November last year, a private investor launched another agricultural biogas plant in the nearby town of Półwieś. The local government official supports such solutions because he himself is a farmer who supplies substrate.
“I supply them with corn silage and receive digestate. First, I have a reliable source of sales with stable prices, and secondly, I have ecological fertilizer at the cost of distribution – says Piotr Pietrasik, mayor of Zalewo municipality. – We have green energy and also inflows to the budget.”
He admits that in the future, he would like the municipal government to also implement this
type of investment.
Mayor of Zalewo Municipality
They are also betting on biogas in Szadek municipality (Łódź Voivodeship), where such an installation is already operating in Prusinowice.
Private investors want to build two more 0.5 MW units based on substrates from agricultural production.
“An agricultural biogas plant means local energy security, stabilization of farmers’ income, increased value of processed production, stable energy independent of weather conditions, excellent digestate as fertilizer – a natural water accumulator in the soil – argues Artur Ławniczak, mayor of the town and municipality of Szadek.”
As he emphasizes, for the municipality it means security and income stabilization for a larger group of
residents. The biogas plant operating in Prusinowice has provided employment and brought
additional tax revenue to the municipality.
Mayor of Szadek city and municipality
The mayor reveals that the municipality also plans to use heat from the biogas plant to heat the school and apartment blocks in Prusinowice.
“We are looking for funds to build the installation – a heat supply pipeline” – admits Artur Ławniczak.
Examples from small municipalities across the country lead to an obvious conclusion. There’s no time to waste, as the benefits of investing in green energy are visible to the naked eye. Agricultural biogas plants producing energy from what farmers supply them with are a solution that residents of municipalities should demand from the leaders of their “local communities”. These are concrete benefits: earnings for the municipality and farmers, as well as clean air and savings on energy bills.
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Whether you want to invest in a biomethane plant, check your land’s potential, or simply learn more.
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