RNG NEWS
Stay up to date with the latest stories, insights, and announcements.53% of US NGV fuel in 2020 was RNG
Fifty-three percent of all on-road fuel used in natural gas vehicles in 2020 was renewable natural gas (RNG), according to new figures.
Natural Gas Vehicles for America (NGVAmerica) and the Coalition for Renewable Natural Gas (RNG Coalition) reported that RNG as a transport fuel grew by 25% over 2019 volumes, increasing 267% over the last five years.
The organisations report that in 2020, a total of 646 million gallons of natural gas were used as motor fuel. Of that, 345 million gallons were from renewable sources.
The Truth About Cows and Greenhouse Gas Emissions
At our dairy farm, I’ve been working to reduce methane emissions nearly my entire life. I can tell you it’s not a black and white issue (or a brown and white one, depending on your breed of cow). Here’s how sustainable farming works at our fifth-generation, 600-acre dairy farm in Deerfield, Massachusetts.
Cows make a lot of milk and a lot of manure; both are important to us. We make about 2,500 gallons of milk a day to feed our local communities. It travels on average 48 hours from farm to store. Each of our cows also creates about 80 pounds of manure a day. We reduce greenhouse gas emissions by turning methane from manure into renewable natural gas (RNG).
Conditional Approval for Bioenergy Devco’s Poultry AD project
Bioenergy Devco has secured conditional approval from Sussex County Council in Delaware to build one of the state’s first anaerobic digesters.
According to an article by the Delaware Business Times, Devco, based in Maryland, bought the former Perdue Farms AgriRecycle facility and continues to compost 30,000 tons of poultry waste from the site. Now, the company plans to extract biogas from the waste.
Fortistar to Build Minnesota RNG Project at Pine Bend
A new renewable natural gas (RNG) plant has been approved to be built at the Pine Bend Sanitary Landfill in Inver Grove Heights, Minnesota.
The plant, which will be the first of its kind in the state, will be built and run by Fortistar, a White Plains, New York-based investment firm that provides capital to build and manage companies that create green energy sources. It will be one of about 70 such facilities nationwide, reports the Star Tribune.
Phoenix-based Republic Services, which owns the Pine Bend landfill, will lease Fortistar the land for the 12,000-square foot facility. The RNG plant is expected to be operational by March 2022.
Wage Energy, RGMRM & Energir Join Forces on Quebec RNG
Waga Energy, the Mauricie Residual Materials Management Board (RGMRM) and Énergir are joining forces to launch a renewable natural gas (RNG) injection project at the Saint-Étienne-des-Grés landfill site, the first project of its kind on Canadian soil. The WAGABOX® technology that will be used for this project allows landfill site operators to recover the gas emanating from these sites in the form RNG, also known as biomethane.
As part of this project, Waga Energy is committing to purchasing the gas produced by waste products from the RGMRM for a twenty-year period. To recover it, Waga Energy will build a treatment unit on the site, using its WAGABOX® patented technology. Waga Energy will fund the unit’s construction and operation, as well as the costs of connecting the site to the local gas network. Énergir will purchase RNG production from Waga Energy, thus contributing to achieving the Quebec government’s objective of introducing a 10% share of renewable gas into the network by 2030.
CMA CGM Launches Low-Carbon Shipping with Biomethane
The CMA CGM Group has reached another milestone in its efforts to be carbon-neutral by 2050, by supporting the production of 12,000 tonnes of biomethane (equivalent to a year’s fuel consumption of two 1,400-TEU ships).
As of May 2021, the Group’s customers will be able to select biomethane via the Act with CMA CGM+ range of services, paving the way for a substantial reduction in the environmental impact of the shipping of their goods.
On this occasion, Rodolphe Saadé, Chairman and CEO of the CMA CGM Group, declared: “We have crossed a new step with the launch of the first low-carbon shipping offer based on biomethane. We know that there is still a long way to go to meet the commitments of the Paris Agreement. Achieving these goals do not rely on a single solution but on a set of initiatives and new technologies complimentary to each other.”
Gevo To Build RNG Project in Northwest Iowa
Gevo, Inc. (NASDAQ: GEVO), announced that it has closed a $68 Million Green Bond private activity bonds offering to finance the construction of its renewable natural gas project in Northwest Iowa. The RNG Project will generate RNG captured from dairy cow manure.
“We are also pleased that our dairy partners will reap benefits from the RNG Project given that the manure digesters should improve the farms’ sustainability and lay the groundwork for more efficient recycling of nutrients and better soil health,” said Patrick R. Gruber, Chief Executive Officer of Gevo.
Clean Energy Signs Agreement with Amazon for Low and Negative Carbon RNG
Clean Energy Fuels Corp. (Nasdaq: CLNE) today announced that it has signed an agreement with Amazon (Nasdaq: AMZN) to provide low and negative carbon renewable natural gas (RNG). The fuel will be provided at 27 existing Clean Energy fueling stations and another 19 non-exclusive new or upgraded Clean Energy-owned stations that Clean Energy expects to be constructed by the end of the year. The new and existing stations will provide RNG in 15 different states.
“If the world is really going to tackle the issue of climate change, all of us need to find solutions that work both environmentally and economically, and that is exactly what this agreement supports,” said Andrew J. Littlefair, CEO and president of Clean Energy. “Clean Energy was the first to commercially make RNG available as a vehicle fuel in 2013 and now fuels tens of thousands of vehicles across the country every day.”
The Brothers who Sold Rice Energy to EQT for $8.2 Billion Have Now Decided to Make Renewable Gas from Landfills their Family’s Biggest Investment
The SPAC called Rice Acquisition Corp. announced a deal yesterday to acquire Aria Energy for $680 million and Archaea Energy for $347 million and combine the two into a new company that would become the nation’s biggest producer of zero-carbon renewable natural gas captured from landfills.
Capturing this gas — which would otherwise have just wafted up out of our trash piles and into the atmosphere — is one of the most cost effective and scalable ways to reduce both carbon emissions and the carbon footprint of our fuels.
Once the deal closes later this year, the Rice SPAC (NYSE: RICE) will be renamed Archaea Energy, and be helmed by Nick Stork. They’ll start off producing about 5 million mmBtus of landfill gas per year from nearly a dozen projects, with 20 more in the works, and an eye toward tripling output within three years. Their biggest development is in Dunmore, Pennsylvania at the Keystone landfill, which receives garbage from New York and New Jersey. At 50 million tons in place it’s one of the nation’s biggest and getting bigger, and will produce gas for the next 30 years.
Archaea Energy to Become the Leading RNG Platform in the U.S. Through Combination with Aria Energy
Archaea Energy LLC (“Archaea”), an emerging leader in the development and advancement of renewable natural gas (RNG), announced today an agreement to enter into a business combination with Aria Energy LLC (“Aria”) led by Rice Acquisition Corporation (NYSE: RICE) (“RAC”), a special purpose acquisition company focused on the energy transition sector. The business combination with Archaea and Aria, one of the largest companies in the North American landfill gas (LFG) sector, will create the leading U.S. RNG platform. The combined company, which will be called Archaea Energy (the “combined Company”), will be dedicated to reducing carbon emissions through landfill gas conversion, CO2 sequestration, and green hydrogen.
“Archaea was founded to create green energy from methane produced through anaerobic digestion, a greenhouse gas 25 times more harmful than carbon dioxide,” said Nicholas Stork, Archaea Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer. “We are on a trajectory to become a leading RNG platform in North America, serving our decarbonization partners under long-term supply agreements. Our mission is to reduce the carbon intensity (CI) of vented and flared methane and empower corporations, universities, municipalities and utilities to meet their sustainability goals.”
Don’t miss an update—join our weekly newsletter below.