RNG’s Rising Tide: How Biogas is Powering U.S. Energy Independence

Emily Nguyen 4

Welcome back to the 3 Rivers Energy Partners podcast. I’m Emily, and today we’re diving into what I’d call the new RNG landscape—how biogas has officially become big business in the U.S.

Alex Rivera 4

And I’m Alex. If you work in food and beverage, ag, waste, or you run a fleet, this episode is basically about money you might be leaving on the table… and carbon you could be avoiding.

Emily Nguyen 4

Let’s ground this really simply. Biogas is the gas that’s naturally produced when organic material—so manure, food waste, wastewater sludge, trash in landfills—breaks down without oxygen. It’s mostly methane and CO₂. When we clean it up to pipeline quality and use it like conventional natural gas, that’s renewable natural gas, or RNG.

Alex Rivera 4

Yeah, and what’s changed is the scale. According to the American Biogas Council, in just the 12 months ending December 2025, the U.S. saw 70 new biogas projects come online. That’s over 2 billion dollars in new domestic recycling infrastructure in a single year.

Emily Nguyen 4

And when you zoom out, we’re now at nearly 2,600 biogas facilities nationwide. Together, they can capture about 780.7 billion cubic feet of biogas per year. That’s enough energy to power roughly 5.2 million homes for a year, and it represents about a 7.5% increase in capture capacity just in 2025.

Alex Rivera 4

So this is not a niche pilot space anymore. This is an industry that’s putting real steel in the ground. Let’s break down where that growth is actually coming from, because it’s not all one kind of project.

Emily Nguyen 4

Right. Landfill gas projects are still the workhorse. We’ll unpack that more later, but in 2025 the industry added 20 new landfill gas capture projects, bringing that total to 599. They attracted about 912 million dollars in capital, which is roughly 43% of all biogas investment that year.

Alex Rivera 4

Then you’ve got agriculture. Farms led new construction by project count. Forty new farm-based systems in 2025, representing about 835 million dollars, mainly in rural communities. Farm methane capture jumped 11%, up to about 99 billion cubic feet per year.

Emily Nguyen 4

Food waste-only projects saw a really big relative jump too. Investment in that sector more than doubled compared to the prior year, to about 325 million dollars, driving an 18% increase in biogas capture to around 28 billion cubic feet annually.

Alex Rivera 4

And quietly in the background, wastewater treatment plants are still the largest sector by site count—over twelve hundred operational systems, nearly half of all U.S. biogas sites. Growth there is slower because it’s a mature sector; some of those plants have been running digesters for a long time.

Emily Nguyen 4

So why are businesses suddenly paying so much attention? I’d say two big drivers. First, waste liability. Manure lagoons, food waste hauling, landfill tipping fees—those are all costs and in many cases regulatory risks. Biogas projects literally turn that liability into a feedstock.

Alex Rivera 4

And second, energy strategy. Biogas systems produce renewable electricity, heat, and RNG. That gives companies a twenty four seven, dispatchable energy source that can help stabilize energy costs and reduce exposure to fossil fuel price swings.

Emily Nguyen 4

Plus, from a climate standpoint, capturing methane that would have gone to the atmosphere is huge. Depending on the project, biogas can have a carbon intensity that’s about 50% to as much as 700% lower than fossil fuels. That’s a big lever for companies with emissions targets.

Alex Rivera 4

So if you’re a decision-maker, I’d frame RNG as two things at once: it’s a waste-management solution that can clean up your environmental footprint, and it’s a strategic energy asset that can deliver lower-carbon fuel or power and more predictable costs. Those two together are why we’re seeing billions flow into the space.

Emily Nguyen 4

Let’s get into how the different feedstock sectors are actually evolving, because “biogas” sounds like one thing, but landfill gas versus farm manure versus food waste are very different business stories.

Alex Rivera 4

Totally. Starting with landfills. Even though there are fewer landfill gas facilities than farm or wastewater sites, they capture about 72% of all U.S. biogas. That’s a massive share of the pie from just under 600 facilities.

Emily Nguyen 4

Historically, a lot of landfill gas was just flared—literally burned off—to reduce methane emissions. Now, more of that gas is being used as an energy product. Many of the newer landfill projects are designed to upgrade landfill gas to RNG, though electricity generation is still the dominant end use in that sector and for the biogas industry overall.

Alex Rivera 4

From a business perspective, that shift from flaring to energy means you go from treating gas as a compliance headache to treating it as a revenue stream—via power sales, RNG sales, or environmental credits. That’s a big mindset change.

Emily Nguyen 4

On the ag side, farms are where a lot of the construction action is. Like we said, 40 new farm-based systems in 2025 and an 11% jump in methane capture, up to about 99 billion cubic feet per year. Most of these new projects are built with RNG in mind, especially to serve transportation fuel markets.

Alex Rivera 4

And farms get this really nice bundle of benefits. You’re managing manure more sustainably, which can help with odors and water quality, and you’re producing renewable energy. On top of that, the digestate—the material left after digestion—is a nutrient-rich soil additive.

Emily Nguyen 4

Exactly. There’s good evidence that digestate could potentially boost organic matter, carbon, and micronutrients in soil, which improves crop yields. So you’re closing the loop: feed animals, capture manure, generate energy, and put better soil nutrients back on the fields.

Alex Rivera 4

Then there’s food waste. That sector is smaller by project count—around one hundred twenty four food-waste-only biogas projects—but it’s growing fast. Investment more than doubled in 2025, and capture jumped 18% to about 28 billion cubic feet a year.

Emily Nguyen 4

And remember, that doesn’t count the roughly 200 agriculture and wastewater facilities that also co-digest food waste with manure or biosolids. So there’s this hybrid model where an existing digester becomes a regional organics hub, taking in food waste for a tipping fee and boosting gas production.

Alex Rivera 4

This is where organics diversion policies come in. As more cities and states push to keep food waste out of landfills, someone has to handle those organics. Digesters are increasingly that “someone,” which means new revenue lines for the plant—tipping fees plus energy sales.

Emily Nguyen 4

Wastewater treatment plants follow a similar logic. They already have digesters in many cases. By accepting outside organics—like food processing residuals—they can increase gas yield and improve project economics, again getting paid on both the waste side and the energy side.

Alex Rivera 4

So across all four sectors—landfill, agriculture, food waste, wastewater—the big transformation is this: waste streams are being reclassified as feedstocks. That’s what “waste to value” really means. Instead of paying just to get rid of material, you’re designing a system that can generate energy, soil, and sometimes even new service revenues.

Emily Nguyen 4

Let’s shift to transportation, because this is where RNG has gotten a lot of attention and where the numbers from 2025 are pretty striking.

Alex Rivera 4

Yeah, out of the 70 new biogas projects that came online in 2025, 68 were built to upgrade gas to RNG specifically. That’s almost all of them.

Emily Nguyen 4

As a result, we now have 659 facilities in the U.S. supplying biogas for RNG production. Total RNG output rose about 24% in 2025, to two hundred twenty five point six million M.M.B.T.U. To put that into something tangible, that’s enough energy to fuel roughly 8.2 million vehicles.

Alex Rivera 4

So if you’re running trucks, buses, or specialized fleets, RNG isn’t this theoretical thing—it’s already out there in scale. And a big piece of the value stack is low-carbon fuel and clean fuel programs. We won’t go deep into policy mechanics, but the basic idea is: when you use RNG as a vehicle fuel, you can generate credits because of its lower carbon intensity.

Emily Nguyen 4

Right. Those credits can help fleets effectively lower their fuel cost while also cutting Scope 1 emissions, because you’re swapping out fossil fuel in your own vehicles for a much lower-carbon alternative. That’s a direct lever on operational, tailpipe emissions.

Alex Rivera 4

We’ve talked a lot about fuel and credits, but there’s another angle I don’t want people to miss: resilience. Biogas projects provide energy that’s available 24/7, 365 days a year.

Emily Nguyen 4

Yeah, in grid language, biogas is “dispatchable.” A well-run digester with gas storage and engine or turbine capacity can ramp power up or down as needed. That’s really valuable for grid reliability and for critical facilities—think water treatment plants, hospitals, food processing plants.

Alex Rivera 4

And this is happening all over the country. Biogas projects operate in every U.S. state. In 2025, seven states—Texas, California, Illinois, Idaho, Washington, Wisconsin, and Florida—each attracted more than 100 million dollars in capital for new biogas projects.

Emily Nguyen 4

Those investments aren’t just climate investments; they’re local economic development. You’re strengthening waste management infrastructure, creating construction and operations jobs, and improving energy security by producing more energy close to where it’s used.

Alex Rivera 4

Let’s walk through a simple, hypothetical example. Imagine a regional waste hub in, say, Wisconsin. You’ve got dairy farms supplying manure, a food processor sending organic residuals, and maybe a municipality diverting food scraps away from landfill.

Emily Nguyen 4

All of that goes into a centralized digester. The biogas is cleaned up into RNG and injected into a nearby pipeline. That RNG is then contracted to fuel local fleets—milk haulers, municipal trucks, maybe regional delivery fleets.

Alex Rivera 4

At the same time, the hub could run combined heat and power units onsite. That gives the facility its own electricity and heat, and potentially exports power to the local grid—providing a steady, controllable resource that complements solar and wind in the region.

Emily Nguyen 4

On the back end, you’ve got digestate going back to farms as a more predictable soil additive product, improving soils and potentially reducing the need for synthetic fertilizer. So within a pretty tight radius, you’ve turned waste into local fuel, local power, and local soil health benefits.

Alex Rivera 4

And if there’s a grid disruption—storms, heat waves—those dispatchable biogas generators can be part of keeping critical loads powered. That kind of resilience is something a lot of communities are starting to value more as extreme weather becomes more common.

Emily Nguyen 4

So energy independence here isn’t abstract. It’s: less imported fuel, more home-grown energy, and infrastructure that keeps your essential services running when the grid is stressed. Biogas projects are one of the few renewable options that can check all those boxes simultaneously.

Emily Nguyen 4

Let’s talk about the climate math and the economic upside, because this is where biogas can look almost too good to be true if you just see the headline numbers.

Alex Rivera 4

Yeah, and we should be clear and careful. The American Biogas Council points out that because some biogas projects capture methane that would otherwise be emitted, they can have a carbon intensity that’s roughly 50% to as much as 700% lower than fossil fuels.

Emily Nguyen 4

That huge range reflects different project types and assumptions, but the direction is consistent: capturing and using methane is far better for the climate than letting it leak or flare. Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas, so keeping it out of the atmosphere has a big impact.

Alex Rivera 4

Now zooming out: the ABC estimates the U.S. could build more than 17,000 additional biogas systems. If fully developed, those could produce up to 25 gigawatts of always-available renewable electricity. That’s a lot of firm, round-the-clock power.

Emily Nguyen 4

They estimate that building out that potential would also create an estimated 900,000 short-term construction jobs and about 45,000 permanent operations jobs. So you’re getting emissions reductions, plus workforce and manufacturing opportunities.

Alex Rivera 4

But if you’re a CFO or a sustainability lead, you’re probably thinking: what does that mean for my business? I’d translate it into four buckets—risk mitigation, brand value, regulatory preparedness, and total cost of ownership.

Emily Nguyen 4

On risk mitigation, biogas projects help you manage waste and compliance risk—whether that’s manure, biosolids, or food waste. They also can reduce exposure to volatile fossil fuel prices by giving you a more predictable energy source.

Alex Rivera 4

Brand value is the reputational side. Being able to say you’re turning your own waste into clean energy, or fueling fleets with low-carbon RNG, is a powerful story for customers, investors, and employees—especially when you can point to real numbers like lower carbon intensity.

Emily Nguyen 4

Regulatory preparedness is about staying ahead of where policy is going. More jurisdictions are implementing organics diversion, clean fuel standards, and stricter emissions rules. Engaging with biogas and RNG now can position you to comply at lower cost later.

Alex Rivera 4

And then total cost of ownership. When you look at a 10- or 15-year horizon, factoring in potential credits, avoided disposal costs, and more stable energy pricing, biogas and RNG can compare very favorably to business-as-usual—even if the upfront work is more complex.

Emily Nguyen 4

So those macro statistics—17,000 potential projects, 25 gigawatts, hundreds of thousands of jobs—aren’t just national talking points. They’re a signal that there’s room for many more businesses and communities to capture both climate and economic value if they move thoughtfully into this space.

Alex Rivera 4

To wrap up, let’s get practical. If you’re listening to this as an executive or sustainability lead and thinking, “Okay, how do I actually plug RNG into my strategy?”, where do you start?

Emily Nguyen 4

I’d start with a simple checklist. First: assess your waste streams. Do you have manure, process wastewater, food processing residuals, off-spec product, or access to landfill gas? Even if you don’t own the waste, you might be near someone who does.

Alex Rivera 4

Second: look at your energy load profile. Where do you use the most energy—steam, electricity, natural gas, vehicle fuel? Constant loads like refrigeration or baseload process heat can pair really well with biogas or RNG.

Emily Nguyen 4

Third: analyze your fleet fuel mix. Do you operate trucks, buses, forklifts, or off-road equipment that could transition to use RNG as a fuel, directly or through contracted supply?

Alex Rivera 4

And fourth: map the policy and incentive landscape in your state. Are there organics diversion mandates, clean fuel programs, or utility incentives for renewable gas or power? Those can significantly change project economics.

Emily Nguyen 4

Once you’ve done that homework, there are a few main partnership pathways. One is a host-site project on your facilities. A developer designs, builds, owns, and operates the digester and gas upgrading on your site; you provide the waste and maybe take some of the energy back under contract.

Alex Rivera 4

Second is pure offtake from third-party plants. You don’t host anything—you just contract for RNG supply or environmental attributes from an existing or planned project. That can be a lighter-touch way to start.

Emily Nguyen 4

And third is participating in regional hubs or consortia—pooling waste, capital, or demand with other players in your area. That’s especially relevant for smaller generators who can’t justify a project on their own.

Alex Rivera 4

Whatever pathway you choose, due diligence is key. Ask about the technology: is it proven at the scale and feedstock you’re talking about? What’s the developer’s track record with similar projects?

Emily Nguyen 4

Review contract terms carefully: who owns the gas, the power, and the environmental attributes? How are risks around feedstock variability, downtime, or policy changes allocated? And what does success look like for both sides over the life of the agreement?

Alex Rivera 4

Finally, make sure RNG and biogas fit into your broader ESG and net-zero roadmaps. Which scopes are you targeting? How will you measure and report the benefits? And how does this investment interact with other decarbonization steps you’re planning?

Emily Nguyen 4

If you treat RNG as one strategic tool—alongside efficiency, electrification, and other renewables—you’re much more likely to build a portfolio that delivers both climate impact and solid financial performance.

Alex Rivera 4

We covered a lot today, but the bottom line is: the biogas and RNG space is growing fast, backed by real data and investment, and there’s still a lot of untapped potential.

Emily Nguyen 4

We’ll keep unpacking specific project models and case studies in future episodes. For now, Alex, thanks for the conversation.

Alex Rivera 4

Always fun, Emily. And thanks to everyone listening. We’ll talk to you next time.