Green gas - biomethane

Biomethane is a direct substitute for fossil natural gas that can be used by businesses to help tackle scope 1 emissions. It is currently the only carbon neutral or negative gas available immediately and in commercial quantities. It is an ideal fuel for difficult to decarbonise sectors like shipping, heat and heavy transport.

Electricity has many established pathways to decarbonisation. Businesses with significant gas or heat use however, don't have the same availability and immediacy of options to decarbonise this section of their emissions. This is where biomethane provides an immediate solution.

As the name suggests, biomethane is derived from organic materials through a process known as anaerobic digestion.

Through partnering with Future Biogas on the production of this gas, businesses can effectively decarbonise their gas and heat networks within their existing infrastructure. Biomethane is chemically identical to fossil gas, meaning it can be injected directly into and distributed via the existing gas grid. Because we operate via sleeving arrangements, no costly investment in infrastructure is required on behalf of the offtaker either.

Crucially, by purchasing unsubsidised gas, your business can claim the full additionality of the biomethane being injected into the grid. The true additionality of gas created via government subsidy will always come into question from the perspective of corporate offtakers declaring it as part of their emissions reduction.

Future Biogas is one of the UK’s largest producers of biomethane. We inject over 500 GWh of this renewable green gas into the grid each year via the 12 AD sites we operate. As part of Project Carbon Harvest, Future Biogas is now building a series of new, unsubsidised Anaerobic Digestion (AD) plants.

Our AD plants are fed with rotationally-grown energy crops, grown locally using regenerative farming practices – including cover cropping, minimal tillage and application of organic biofertilisers.

Because we operate within food crop rotations with energy crops grown as break crops, we operate within and helping to decarbonise food production.

Our approach and methodology in growing the feedstocks for our AD plants supports farms in their transition to sustainable agricultural practices – offering a broad range of benefits, including: increasing biodiversity, enhancing food and energy security, and building agricultural resilience to climate change.

To read more about why environmentally-conscious businesses are implementing biomethane partnerships, visit our "Why Biomethane?" page.