By 2050,
it is expected that the UK will have reached net-zero carbon emissions. Since
the introduction of the Climate Change Act, the UK has made considerable
progress towards emission reduction, and a lot of this progress has come from
the decarbonisation of the electricity we use. In order to reach net-zero, the
scope for decarbonisation will have to expand, in particular in the heat sector.
Power from
anaerobic digestion (AD) facilities goes some way towards the UK’s
decarbonisation efforts and the advantages are multifaceted. Heating in the UK
takes up a vast amount of energy, and low-carbon heating options expected to be
part of the solution include biogas upgraded to biomethane for grid injection. In
addition to this greening of the gas grid, processing of biodegradable wastes
helps to decarbonise the waste sector and encourage a circular economy.
A slow start to the year
Currently there are 579 operational AD plants in the UK,
with 331 AD projects under development. Between April 2019 and April 2020, only
7 new plants commissioned, despite 47 plants being under construction in April
2019, but this isn’t a fair reflection of the where the industry is at. A lot
of the slow start to 2020 can be attributed to poor weather conditions and the
Covid-19 pandemic, which has meant many AD facilities have not reached or
finalised the commissioning phase when expected. In addition, food waste
collections were halted temporarily and the hospitality sector was forced to shut
down when the pandemic hit earlier in the year, and as a result a lack of
feedstock has been issue for some AD facilities.
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