ImpactAlpha, December 15 — Chicago-based Amp Americas builds and manages anaerobic digesters to convert dairy waste into renewable natural gas, while reducing emissions of methane and carbon.
Amp offers “an attractive model for reducing methane pollution and expanding the renewable natural gas market,” said Generate’s John Dannan.
Amp will acquire from Generate two anaerobic digesters and two gas processing plants in Indiana that capture methane from around 1.5 million gallons of dairy waste daily. Generate tapped Amp in 2012 to develop the projects.
Renewable portfolios
Amp also acquired three anaerobic digesters in Idaho, along with two gas processing and an electric generator, that capture methane from more than 940,000 gallons of dairy waste daily.
With the transactions, Amp says it will manage seven of the largest dairy biogas-to-transportation assets in the U.S., producing renewable natural gas from over 100,000 cows.
Last month, Annapolis, Md.-based Bioenergy Devco secured $100 million to build anaerobic digesters in the U.S.
Methane markets
Equilibrium Capital says its dairy-waste biogas plants are generating revenues of about $25 million a year from credits under California’s Low-Carbon Fuel Standards and federal renewable fuel standards (for background see, “The sky-high value of cutting methane emissions is attracting policymakers – and investors”).
“We may sell our methane for $5 and our environmental credits associated with that could be $80,” Equilibrium’s Dave Chen told ImpactAlpha. A ton of methane has at least 80 times the warming power of carbon dioxide in its first 20 years.
