Legislation will accelerate biogas industry growth at no cost to tax payers

WASHINGTON— Today, the American Biogas Council applauded the introduction of the Clean Energy Standard Act of 2012 (CES). The CES uses a market based approach to encourage a wide variety of electricity-generating technologies including renewable, baseload power from biogas. Biogas is produced from organic waste using a natural process called anaerobic digestion. Biogas can be used to make renewable electricity and is a renewable substitute for natural gas.

Beginning in 2015, the CES would set a standard for clean energy on the largest utilities. These utilities would need to sell a percentage of their electricity from clean energy sources, and each year would need to sell a slightly greater amount of clean energy.

Since biogas, made from waste like food scraps, wastewater and animal manure creates clean energy, the CES provides a stable, long-term market opportunity for the biogas industry to help utilities to meet the CES goals. It will create American jobs in the biogas industry, enhance national security and fuel diversity, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

"Today, over 2,200 sites in the U.S. produce renewable biogas from organic waste. And more than 11,000 future urban and rural sites have been identified to produce biogas," said Patrick Serfass, Executive Director of the American Biogas Council. "The Clean Energy Standard recognizes the biogas industry's significant role in using local resources to create clean energy from biogas. We thank Senator Bingaman for his determined leadership on clean energy and for introducing this bill."

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About the American Biogas Council

The non-profit American Biogas Council represents over 140 companies dedicated to maximizing the production and use of biogas from organic waste. Members include anaerobic digester designers, multi-national engine manufacturers, farmers, waste management companies, municipalities, natural gas providers, engineering and law firms, non profits, universities and other organizations covering the entire biogas supply chain.