The World Biogas Association (WBA) and its leading corporate members will present the UN Climate Change Conference COP 25 meeting which starts next week with a Declaration in which they commit to delivering the full potential of biogas by 2030 and call upon world governments to support the ambition.

David Newman, WBA President and WBA Chief Executive Charlotte Morton will deliver the Declaration in person to H.E. Patricia Espinosa, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change at the COP25 meeting in Spain. The WBA is an Observer Party to the Conference, which takes place in Madrid from 2^nd to 13^th December. 

In the Biogas and Climate Change Commitment Declaration, major biogas industry corporations, led by the Association, are calling on the world's governments to act urgently to unlock the sector's potential to cut global greenhouse gases emissions by at least 12% within the next 10 years – and therefore make a considerable contribution towards meeting their Paris Agreement targets.

It is the first time that so many biogas organisations have joined forces to both demand - and deliver - solutions to address climate change.

If all barriers were removed, the biogas industry could abate up to 4bn tonnes of CO2 equivalent annually, representing at least 12% of today's global emissions, by 2030. Today only 2% of the feedstock available globally to produce biogas is captured and recycled.

In its recent report, the Global Potential of Biogas, WBA estimated that the number of industrial plants operating globally are currently 132,000. By 2030 there needs to be at least 1 million large scale installations (each handling over 100,000 t/pa of feedstock) plus millions of smaller scale digesters, to achieve the emissions reductions targets.

All of these units would enable the biogas industry to prevent 4bn tonnes of CO2 equivalent from being emitted annually – the equivalent of all the emissions of the EU28 in 2017. The sector will need to invest some $5 trillion to design, build and operate those plants, but all barriers to those investments existing today must be eliminated if the industry is to achieve its goal.

If deployed to its full potential, WBA estimates that the industry would employ around 10 million people worldwide, from 350,000 currently

WBA President David Newman said:

"With measures on the ground not yet aligned with countries' Paris Agreement targets and UN Sustainable Development Goals commitments, the biogas industry calls on the world's governments to urgently pass legislation to unleash the enormous potential of the biogas industry.”

“We provide a ready to use technology to cut emissions in the hardest to decarbonise sectors, while creating a circular system that transforms the greenhouse gas-emitting organic wastes society produces into renewable energy, biofertilisers and other valuable bioproducts.

“The speed at which climate change is accelerating emphasises the urgent need for responses that go beyond business-as-usual to remove the barriers to large scale investment in biogas technologies. We need decisive actions now."

The signatories to the Declaration are companies that develop and finance, design, build and operate industrial anaerobic digestion plants and related infrastructure globally to treat and recycle biodegradable wastes and feedstocks to produce biogas or biomethane, green CO2, natural fertilisers and other bioproducts.

Click here to download the full report Global Potential of Biogas