Biomethane: new decrees

Last August marked a very important milestone for the biogas and biomethane sector: the long-awaited arrival of two key decrees has finally brought greater clarity, completing the regulatory framework. These are the new Sustainability Decree—which updates the national certification system for biogas and biomethane—and the so-called FER 2, which defines the incentive scheme for electricity generation plants from biogas below 300 kW.

All conditions are now in place for the sector to take off, pending the rankings of the competitive procedures (4th and 5th rounds) under the 2022 Decree.

After limited participation in the first three calls, with less than 40% of the available capacity allocated (a figure further reduced by the withdrawal of many projects in order to reapply in subsequent calls), a reversal of this trend is now expected.

As of today, net of withdrawals, the first two procedures have resulted in just over 100 million standard cubic meters per year being awarded, compared to the nearly 2 billion incentivized volumes envisaged by the decree.

Considering that Italy’s estimated potential exceeds 6 billion Sm³ of annual production, and that plants commissioned under the 2018 Decree could bring total output to just over 3 billion, it is clear that the path toward a leading role in biomethane production in Europe has only just begun.

At InfraLab, we have long been working to develop a pipeline of both greenfield and brownfield initiatives to help achieve this goal.