Government Policy - Supporting AD in 2009

02 February 2010

An overview of how the UK Government supported the development of Anaerobic Digestion in 2009.

February

The UK Government with the help of a broad range of stakeholders started the year by aiming to shape the overall direction of the AD industry by publishing Shared Goals. This aimed to make AD an established technology by 2020 and outlined what it could deliver nationally and in specific sectors, such as agricultural and transport. The Shared Goals vision committed the UK to set up regulatory and economic frameworks to help AD and its outputs thrive.

March

Defra formed an AD Task Group to develop recommendations to deliver the shared goals.

July

The implementation plan was published and focused on five areas: technology, regulation, economics and markets, demonstration plants and monitoring and reporting.

September

Anaerobic Digestion and Biogas Association, ADBA, was launched at the UK's Dairy Event. ADBA is the new trade association for the biogas industry. It will focus on promoting a change in regulation to create the environment in which over 1,000 plants can be built in Britain by 2020, 75% in the agricultural sector, which will cost just £5 billion to construct and will produce £1.7 billion worth of gas per year at today's prices.

October

One key feature of July's Implementation Plan was better communication. In October, the National Non-Food Crop Centre released a new online advice portal at http://www.biogas-info.co.uk/