Dive Brief:

• The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) released a comprehensive plan illustrating how 11,000 anaerobic digestion plants have the potential to reduce emissions by using biogas as a transportation fuel or to create energy from waste.
• The White House released a Climate Action Plan Strategy to Reduce Methane Emissions in March. The plan served to provide incentives to spark a greater number of cost-effective biogas waste-to-energy technologies.
• The "roadmap" released by the USDA found that 2,000 plants across the U.S. use biogas as an energy source. 11,000 additional biogas systems could be built, resulting in the generation of enough energy to power over 3 million homes.

Dive Insight:

According to the plan, in order to expand the use of biogas to meet renewable energy goals, the federal government will need to promote the use of biogas through existing agency programs and eliminating financial barriers by promoting investment in the systems. The U.S. market will need to advance significantly to accept renewable energy from biogas projects and to coordinate messaging across federal agencies.