Europe’s farmers stir up biogas to offset Russian energy

SONCHAMP, France — In lush fields southwest of Paris, farmers are joining Europe’s fight to free itself from Russian gas.

They’ll soon turn on the tap of a new facility where crops and agricultural waste are mashed up and fermented to produce “biogas.” It’s among energy solutions being promoted on the continent that wants to choke off funding for Russia’s war in Ukraine by no longer paying billions for Russian fossil fuels.

Small rural gas plants that provide energy for hundreds or thousands of nearby homes aren’t — at least anytime soon — going to supplant the huge flows to Europe of Russian gas that powers economies, factories, business and homes. And critics of using crops to make gas argue that farmers should be concentrating on growing food — especially when prices are soaring amid the fallout of the war in Ukraine, one of the world’s breadbaskets.

Still, biogas is part of the puzzle of how to reduce Europe’s energy dependence.

The European Biogas Association says the European Union could quickly scale up the production of bio-methane, which is pumped into natural gas networks. An investment of 83 billion euros ($87.5 billion) — which, at current market prices, is less than the EU’s 27 nations pay per year to Russia for piped natural gas — would produce a tenfold increase in bio-methane production by 2030 and could replace about a fifth of what the bloc imported from Russia last year, the group says.

The farmers around the Paris-region village of Sonchamp feel their new gas plant will do its bit to untie Europe from the Kremlin.

“It’s not coherent to go and buy gas from those people who are waging war on our friends,” said Christophe Robin, one of the plant’s six investors, who farms wheat, rapeseed, sugar beets and chickens.

“If we want to consume green (energy) and to avoid the flows and contribution of Russian gas, we don’t really have a choice. We have to find alternative solutions,” he said.

Biogas…