American Biogas Council (ABC)
American Biogas Council is a national trade association championing the growth of the biogas industry by representing, informing, connecting and training our members. The American Biogas Council is the voice of the US biogas industry dedicated to maximizing carbon reduction and economic growth using biogas systems. We represent more than 400 companies in all parts of the biogas supply chain who are leading the way to a better future by maximizing all the positive environmental and economic impacts biogas systems offer when they recycle organic material into renewable energy and soil products. The American Biogas Council is a 501(c)(6) non-profit trade association based in Washington, DC.
Company details
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- Business Type:
- Professional association
- Industry Type:
- Bioenergy
- Market Focus:
- Nationally (across the country)
- Employees:
- 101-1000
This company also provides solutions for other industrial applications.
Please, visit the following links for more info:
About us
Biogas systems are often defined by type. Learn more about the difference between a wet and dry digester as well as continuous mix system, plug flow system, and more.
Why Biogas
New to biogas? Learn all about the basics and benefits of biogas.
Harness the Benefits of Biogas
Learn how biogas systems can benefit you, your business, and your community.
Biogas systems protect our air, water, and soil by recycling organic waste into renewable energy and soil products, while reducing GHG emissions.
In the U.S., there is an urgent need to manage the millions of tons of food, water and animal waste. The main benefits of biogas systems come from the fact that they are recycling all this material while also producing renewable energy and soil products which displace fossil fuels.
When you put these and other benefits together, we can prevent tons of carbon emissions from entering our air, prevent nutrients from entering our waterways, create healthier soils with natural, non-fossil fuel-based fertilizers, and produce reliable, baseload renewable energy.
Environmental Benefits
- Recycle manure and kill odors and pathogens while producing renewable energy and soil products
- Help assist the natural cycles of recycling to farming
- Moving manure from open lagoons to an airtight biogas system reduces GHG emissions
- Reduce carbon emissions in transportation by at least half compared to fossil fuels
- Recycling manure creates an opportunity to separate nutrients and keep them out of waterways
- The use of digestate can replace costly synthetic fertilizers and can increase plant growth by 10-30 percent compared to synthetic fertilizers
- Plants absorb soil nutrients, like nitrogen or phosphorus, more easily than raw manure. This allows farmers to use the right volume and ratio of nutrients needed and minimize the additional purchase of synthetic fertilizers.
Economic Benefits
Economic Benefits
- A cost-effective solution to turning a high-cost deliverable like waste treatment into a revenue-generating opportunity for farmers and rural communities
- For companies that want to reduce their carbon footprint, some biogas systems are so carbon negative that replacing a small percentage of fossil gas with renewable biogas or renewable natural gas can help reach net-zero goals
- Create new revenue streams in rural America, building resiliency against commodity price fluctuations.
- Can reduce farm costs for animal bedding and fertilizer and generate new revenue streams.
- A driver for economic growth and offer local jobs in construction, engineering, project management and more
Reduce the volume of waste, meaning that costs are often lowered for facilities like wastewater plants
Energy Benefits
- A renewable source of energy that is a direct replacement for non-renewable, carbon-intensive fossil fuels
- Produce renewable energy 24/7/365 with a reliability rate of 95%–in comparison, the average reliability rate for solar power is 25% and 35% for wind power
- Biogas supports distributed generation of energy, which means lower transmission and transportation costs as well as reduced impact and higher reliability of electrical grids
- Systems with gas storage can provide renewable electricity on demand in minutes, reducing the need to turn on fossil fueled power plants to meet peak demand
- Renewable Natural Gas (RNG) procured from biogas can be used interchangeably with natural gas for heating, electricity, and the production of quality biomethane and transportation fuel
- By purchasing RNG, large gas customers support their ESG goals, reduce fossil fuel use, and decrease their carbon footprint
- The thermal heat needed in industrial manufacturing (that only gas can support) is responsible for around 11% of U.S. emissions. Biogas is currently the most sustainable way to address these emissions.
Biogas Industry Statistics
- Today, the U.S. has more than 2,300 sites producing biogas in 50 states, including 475 farms, 1,269 water resource recovery facilities, 97 stand-alone systems that digest food scraps and nearly 550 landfills.
- The U.S. currently has the potential to build 15,000+ new biogas systems, which would create significant economic, environmental and energy benefits.
- Building out the U.S. biogas infrastructure could produce 100 trillion kilowatt-hours of electricity per year (9.3 million homes), 33 trillion BTU of renewable heat per hour (4.3 million homes), or fuel for vehicles equivalent to 15.4 billion gallons per year (32 million vehicles).
- Building out the U.S. biogas infrastructure could generate at least $45 billion in new capital deployment for construction activity resulting in 375,000 short-term construction jobs and 25,000 permanent jobs.