Biogas: exploitation of a renewable energy in Latin America

Exploitation of biogas is scrutinized in Latin America. Among the developing countries, biogas technology has been most widely applied in this region of the world. Four sectors are successfully using biogas. In the agricultural sector, 9440 digesters have been identified. In the industrial sector, 25 types of wastes have been either investigated for biogas production or are already in full-scale application. Latin America is now the world's leading user of biogas technology in the municipal raw sewage treatment. Thirty-three R&D projects have been reported. Since 1977, five projects of biogas exploitation from sanitary landfills have been implemented. This makes Latin America the leading user of landfill gas technology in the developing countries. High-rate biogas fermentation processes are being developed and increasingly utilized. Several techniques of biogas treatment have been applied. Biogas is mainly used for cooking, lighting, as town gas or as vehicle fuel. The quantity of biogas produced in Latin America is estimated at 217 million m3 per year. Future R & D in biogas technology requires not only technological efforts, but also incitations by national governments and non-governmental organizations (NGO) in order to promote favourable conditions for the exploitation of this renewable energy.