| Energy
The future for on-farm AD
The number of anaerobic digestion plants on UK farms quadrupled between 2012 and
2016, with over 200 facilities now delivering around 250MWe-eq of baseload power, heat
and green gas. That should be no surprise: AD is much more than an ‘add on’ to an
agricultural business, it integrates with almost any farming model to make better use of
wastes, support the use of break and cover crops and reduce input costs as well as the
farm’s carbon footprint.
he industry’s
growth, though,
has been primarily
supported by
renewable
financial
incentives, notably the Feed-in
Tariff and the Renewable Heat
Incentive (RHI). As with other
sources of renewable energy, the
funding available to new projects
has reduced over time, risking the
scale and speed of future growth.
While the development of new
electricity-generating AD is
particularly challenging at present,
the new RHI budget offers some
prospect of support for new
biomethane and biogas heat
projects.
T
Should the government now
look to create drivers around
carbon and farming, rather than
electricity, heat and gas?
The question for the industry,
though, is how we move beyond
www.farmingmonthly.co.uk
reliance on renewable energy
support alone. Reducing
emissions across the economy
remains a huge challenge, and
farming has a vital role to play in
reducing the risks and managing
the impact of climate change. The
Committee on Climate Change
(CCC) says technologies like AD
on farms are essential to meet our
carbon budgets, recognising their
role in driving down agricultural
emi ssions – so should the
government now look to create
drivers around carbon and
farming, rather than electricity,
heat and gas? As our relationship
with Europe changes, what impact
will changes to farming regulation
and support have?
Those are among the questions
that the AD industry is starting to
address. The Anaerobic Digestion
and Bioresources Association
(ADBA) is leading the industry in
finding new opportunities to
support AD, both through changes
in policy and through work on
research and development. The
UK is in the process of building an
academic, manufacturing and
operating base which will have
huge opportunities to offer not
only to farmers here, but also to
export markets around the world.
Those questions and
opportunities will be major issues
for debate at the ADBA National
Conference (8 December 2016),
the industry’s annual policy and
political forum. Alongside
speeches from policy makers and
opinion formers such as the CCC,
the energy networks, academic
researchers and regulators, a key
session will discuss the future for
on-farm and on-site AD, with
contributions from current
operators and future developers.
Farmers and the AD industry
need to work closely together to
ensure the technology can help
meet the challenges agriculture
faces today and tomorrow. We
also need to engage customers:
where technologies like AD are
used to reduce carbon footprints,
businesses like supermarkets and
food suppliers benefit from
marketing lower carbon products –
are there opportunities for them to
support new development? Can
we better show the efforts that the
farming sector is making to reduce
its environmental impact, and
meet consumer demand for lowcarbon products? As debates
around future support for farming
and AD continue, these are just
some of the questions we need to
answer.
Visit adbioresources.org for
more information.
ADBA National Conference
2016
(8 Dec, London) will be
discussing the issues and
opportunities relevant to onfarm AD.
adbioresources.org/adbanational-conference-2016
October 2016 | Farming Monthly | 45