The Importance of Biogas: 10 Benefits for Energy, Cities, Farms and Homes

For many years, the importance of biogas was discussed mainly in terms of renewable energy, waste recycling and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Those benefits remain important. But events in 2026 have brought another advantage sharply into focus: energy security and resilience.

When internationally traded oil and gas supplies are disrupted, the consequences can travel thousands of miles from the original crisis. The disruption of energy shipping through the Strait of Hormuz in 2026 demonstrated just how quickly problems in one region can affect the price and availability of fuel elsewhere.

India provided a striking example. Disruption to Middle Eastern supplies contributed to a serious shortage of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), the bottled cooking gas on which hundreds of millions of households depend. Kitchens, restaurants, hostels and canteens were reported to be conserving LPG and changing what they cooked as supplies tightened.

That raises a deceptively simple question:

What if more of the energy needed by a country, city, farm or household could be produced from resources already available locally?

That is one reason biogas matters.

Biogas can be produced from food waste, animal manure, sewage sludge, crop residues and other biodegradable organic materials. Depending on the scale and technology used, it can provide cooking fuel, heat and electricity, or it can be upgraded to biomethane for use as a substitute for fossil natural gas.

As a result, biogas is more than simply another renewable energy technology. It connects waste management, agriculture, nutrient recycling, renewable energy and increasingly energy security.

Key Takeaways

• Biogas converts locally available organic materials into useful energy.
• It can provide cooking fuel, heat and electricity, while upgraded biomethane can substitute for fossil natural gas in many applications.
• Unlike electricity from wind and solar alone, the energy in biogas can be stored as gas and used when required.
• Biogas plants can simultaneously provide waste treatment and renewable energy production.
• On farms, anaerobic digestion can process manure and other organic materials while producing energy and nutrient-rich digestate.
• Small household biogas plants can provide cooking gas where suitable feedstock, water, space and appropriate equipment are available.
• Large cities can recover energy from food waste and wastewater, while rural communities can use manure and locally available organic residues.
• The energy shocks of 2026 have made the ability to produce energy locally more strategically significant.

What Is Biogas?

Biogas is a combustible gas produced when microorganisms break down biodegradable organic material in the absence of oxygen. This biological process is called anaerobic digestion.

Raw biogas typically contains methane and carbon dioxide together with smaller quantities of other gases. It is the methane content that gives biogas its value as a fuel.

Biogas can be burned directly in suitable equipment for heating and cooking, used in an engine or combined heat and power (CHP) unit to generate electricity and useful heat, or cleaned and upgraded to produce biomethane.

Biomethane has properties sufficiently similar to fossil natural gas for it to be used in gas grids, vehicles and many existing gas applications after appropriate treatment and quality control.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) describes biogas and biomethane as locally produced fuels capable of contributing to energy security, waste management, emissions reduction and agricultural development.

Why Is Biogas Important?

The importance of biogas becomes clearer when its benefits are considered together rather than separately.

1. Biogas Produces Renewable Energy from Organic Material

Every society generates organic material. Farms produce manure and crop residues. Towns and cities generate food waste and sewage. Food and drink manufacturers produce organic residues and wastewater.

Instead of regarding all of these materials simply as wastes requiring disposal, anaerobic digestion can use suitable biodegradable materials as feedstocks for renewable energy production.

This is one of the fundamental advantages of biogas: energy can be recovered from material that already exists within the economy.

2. Biogas Can Turn a Waste Problem into an Energy Resource

Organic wastes can cause environmental problems if badly managed. They may create odour, attract pests, pollute water or release methane during uncontrolled decomposition.

A properly designed and operated anaerobic digestion system places decomposition inside a controlled vessel where the resulting biogas can be captured.

The same process can therefore perform two useful functions:

• treat an organic waste or residue; and
• recover renewable energy from it.

This is particularly valuable for municipalities, wastewater treatment works, farms and food-processing businesses that already have organic materials requiring management.

3. Biogas Is Locally Produced Energy

One of the most important lessons from recent energy-market disruption is that the security of an energy supply depends not only on how much fuel exists, but also on whether it can reliably reach the people who need it.

Oil, LNG and LPG are internationally traded commodities. Ships, pipelines, ports, geopolitical relationships and narrow maritime routes can all become critical links in their supply chains.

Biogas has a different characteristic. Its feedstocks are often inherently local:

• manure is produced on farms;
• food waste is generated in towns and cities;
• sewage is produced wherever people live;
• food-processing residues arise at factories; and
• agricultural residues occur close to where crops and livestock are produced.

This does not make a biogas plant completely independent of the wider economy. Plants still require equipment, maintenance, electricity, replacement parts and skilled operators.

Nevertheless, producing fuel from domestic and local resources can reduce exposure to some of the risks associated with imported fossil fuels.

4. Biogas Can Improve Energy Security and Resilience

Energy security has become an increasingly important reason for governments to consider biogas and biomethane.

The International Energy Agency highlights biogas and biomethane as locally produced fuels that can simultaneously support energy security, emissions reduction and local economic opportunities. That combination is increasingly significant when countries are reconsidering their dependence on internationally traded energy.

This does not mean that anaerobic digestion can replace all imported oil or natural gas. It cannot.

But energy resilience rarely depends upon one technology. A more resilient energy system can include a mixture of wind, solar, hydroelectricity, energy storage, efficiency measures, electrification and locally produced renewable gases such as biogas and biomethane.

Distributed production also has value. Thousands of farms, wastewater treatment works, food factories and municipal facilities producing useful energy create a very different supply structure from dependence upon a limited number of international fuel routes.

5. Biogas Is a Storable Form of Renewable Energy

This characteristic is sometimes overlooked.

Wind turbines generate electricity when sufficient wind is available. Solar photovoltaic panels generate electricity when sufficient sunlight is available.

Biogas contains chemical energy in gaseous form.

Subject to appropriate gas storage, plant design and safety arrangements, production and consumption do not always have to occur at exactly the same instant.

Biogas can therefore complement variable renewable electricity sources.

When upgraded to biomethane and injected into a gas network, the possibilities become much larger because existing gas infrastructure can provide substantial transport and storage capability.

This ability to provide dispatchable renewable energy is one reason biogas can have a role in an energy system containing increasing amounts of wind and solar generation.

6. Biogas Can Be Used for Cooking, Heating, Electricity and Transport

Another important advantage of biogas is its versatility.

Depending upon its quality and the equipment installed, biogas can be used in many different ways.

These include:

• cooking;
• water and space heating;
• steam and process heat;
• electricity generation;
• combined heat and power;
• upgrading to biomethane;
• gas-grid injection; and
• vehicle fuel after suitable upgrading and compression.

This versatility allows a biogas system to be designed around local needs rather than requiring every project to use the gas in the same way.

Home Biogas: Could a Household Produce Its Own Cooking Gas?

Yes, household biogas is a well-established application of anaerobic digestion, particularly in agricultural and rural communities where animal manure and other suitable organic feedstocks are readily available.

The idea gained renewed relevance during the 2026 disruption to LPG supplies.

India is an especially interesting example because LPG cylinders have become an essential part of everyday cooking for hundreds of millions of households. When Middle Eastern LPG supplies were disrupted, shortages affected homes, restaurants, hostels and institutional kitchens.

For a household with sufficient suitable feedstock, water and space, that experience naturally raises the question: could some cooking fuel be produced at home instead?

India already has decades of experience with small biogas systems. The Indian Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) supports small biogas plants for households, farmers and other users, with clean cooking fuel specifically identified as one of the benefits of the programme.

The programme specifically identifies clean cooking fuel as one of the purposes of these plants.

What Does a Home Biogas Plant Use?

Traditional household digesters have commonly used cattle dung mixed with water, although modern systems may accept other suitable biodegradable materials depending upon their design.

A household system requires a reliable daily supply of suitable feedstock. That is one reason home biogas is often particularly appropriate for households that keep cattle or other livestock.

A digester is not a machine that creates energy from occasional kitchen scraps without further consideration. Feed quantity, composition, temperature, water availability, retention time and plant operation all affect gas production.

Can Biogas Replace an LPG Cylinder?

Biogas can replace some or all LPG used for cooking where a household biogas installation produces sufficient gas, but there is an important technical distinction.

Raw biogas and LPG are not interchangeable fuels.

They have different combustion characteristics. The Indian government's biogas programme guidance explains that LPG stoves are not suitable for direct use with biogas and that special biogas burners are required.

Appropriate biogas stoves and correctly designed pipework should therefore be used.

There is also a difference between using raw biogas directly from a household digester and putting upgraded, compressed biomethane into cylinders. Compression and cylinder filling introduce additional gas-cleaning, compression, pressure-vessel and safety requirements and should not be treated as a simple DIY extension to a domestic digester.

Nevertheless, both approaches demonstrate an important property of biogas: organic material can ultimately provide gaseous fuel for applications traditionally served by fossil LPG or natural gas.

7. Biogas Can Reduce Uncontrolled Methane Emissions

Methane is produced naturally when biodegradable material decomposes under anaerobic conditions.

That means methane may be generated from manure stores, wastewater, landfills and other organic materials whether society makes productive use of it or not.

A central environmental purpose of anaerobic digestion is to capture methane in a controlled system and use its energy rather than allow avoidable emissions to escape to the atmosphere.

Good design and operation remain essential because methane leakage from digesters, pipework, gas holders and upgrading equipment reduces both the environmental and economic benefits.

8. Anaerobic Digestion Produces Digestate as Well as Biogas

Biogas is not the only useful product of anaerobic digestion.

After digestion, a nutrient-containing material called digestate remains. Subject to feedstock quality, regulatory requirements and appropriate management, digestate can be used to return nutrients and organic matter to agricultural soils.

This creates another important connection between biogas and resilience.

Countries dependent upon internationally traded energy may also depend upon internationally traded mineral fertilisers and the energy-intensive raw materials used to manufacture them.

Anaerobic digestion can therefore connect local energy production with local nutrient recycling.

Read more about digestate and compost as agricultural biofertilisers.

9. The Importance of Biogas in Agriculture

Biogas and agriculture have a particularly close relationship.

Livestock farms generate manure continuously. Depending upon the farming system and local circumstances, anaerobic digestion can help manage this material while producing useful energy.

Farm biogas may be used for:

• heating;
• electricity generation;
• combined heat and power;
• drying crops or other agricultural products;
• providing process heat;
• upgrading to biomethane; and
• in some circumstances, producing vehicle fuel.

Digestate can then return nutrients to farmland.

This creates a potentially valuable circular relationship:

farm → organic material → digester → biogas + digestate → energy + nutrients → farm.

Not every farm is suitable for anaerobic digestion, and economic viability depends upon plant scale, feedstock, energy use, capital cost, operating cost and local regulation. But where the circumstances are appropriate, agriculture can become both an energy consumer and an energy producer.

10. Biogas Can Bring Particular Benefits to Rural Communities

The importance of biogas is not the same everywhere.

In a European city, the principal opportunity might be capturing energy from separately collected food waste and sewage.

On a large commercial farm, the objective might be manure management, biomethane production and nutrient recycling.

In a rural village elsewhere in the world, the most valuable output may simply be reliable cooking gas produced close to home.

Small-scale biogas can be particularly relevant where communities have livestock, suitable organic material and limited access to reliable modern energy.

Potential benefits can include:

• locally produced cooking fuel;
• reduced dependence on purchased LPG;
• less reliance on traditional solid fuels where biogas replaces them;
• improved management of animal manure;
• production of digestate for agriculture; and
• greater local energy resilience.

These advantages explain why household and community biogas programmes have operated for decades in countries including India, China and Nepal.

Why Biogas Matters to Large Cities

At first sight, a technology associated with manure and farm digesters might appear more relevant to the countryside than to a major city.

In reality, cities generate enormous quantities of biodegradable material.

Every day they produce:

• household food waste;
• commercial food waste;
• restaurant and catering residues;
• supermarket waste;
• food-processing residues; and
• wastewater and sewage sludge.

Those materials represent a potentially significant urban renewable-energy resource.

Modern wastewater treatment works have long used anaerobic digestion to stabilise sewage sludge and recover biogas. Separately collected food waste can similarly be treated at dedicated anaerobic digestion facilities.

For cities, therefore, the importance of biogas lies partly in joining two essential services:

waste management + energy production.

Instead of importing all energy while paying to dispose of organic wastes, part of the material generated within the city can contribute to its own energy system.

From Village Digester to National Energy Infrastructure

One of the remarkable characteristics of anaerobic digestion is its enormous range of scale.

At one end is a small household digester producing gas for cooking.

At the other are industrial plants processing hundreds of thousands of tonnes of organic material and producing grid-quality biomethane.

Between them are farm digesters, community plants, wastewater digesters, food-industry installations and municipal food-waste facilities.

The underlying biological principle is essentially the same: microorganisms convert biodegradable organic matter into methane-rich gas in the absence of oxygen.

That scalability is another reason biogas has strategic value. It is not restricted to either centralised or decentralised energy production.

The Importance of Biogas Has Increased in an Era of Energy Insecurity

It would be wrong to suggest that geopolitical instability suddenly makes every proposed biogas plant economically viable.

It does not.

Nor can biogas alone protect a country from disruption to global oil and gas markets.

What has changed is the value placed on diversification, domestic energy resources and resilience.

The 2026 disruption of shipping through the Strait of Hormuz showed how rapidly a distant conflict could affect cooking fuel and industrial energy supplies in countries dependent upon imports.

For millions of people, energy security ceased to be an abstract government policy phrase. It became a much simpler question:

Will I be able to obtain the fuel I normally use?

Biogas deserves attention in that discussion because its raw materials are not oilfields thousands of kilometres away. They include manure, food waste, sewage and agricultural residues already being produced every day.

That does not eliminate international dependence, but it can reduce it at the margin—and when multiplied across thousands of farms, communities, industries and cities, that contribution can become significant.

Biogas Advantages at a Glance

Frequently Asked Questions About the Importance of Biogas

What is the main importance of biogas?

The main importance of biogas is that it converts biodegradable organic materials into useful renewable energy while also providing a means of managing wastes and recycling nutrients. Increasing concern about energy security adds another benefit because much of the feedstock can be sourced locally.

What are the main advantages of biogas?

Advantages include renewable energy production, organic-waste treatment, methane capture, production of digestate, potential reduction in fossil-fuel consumption, local energy production and the ability to store gaseous energy for later use.

What is biogas used for?

Biogas can be used for cooking, heating, electricity generation and combined heat and power. After upgrading to biomethane it can also be injected into suitable gas grids or used as a transport fuel.

Can biogas be used for home cooking?

Yes. Household biogas digesters are used for cooking in many countries. However, sufficient suitable feedstock and water are required, and raw biogas should be burned in equipment designed or correctly adapted for biogas rather than simply connected to an LPG appliance.

Can home biogas replace LPG?

It can reduce or, in suitable circumstances, replace household LPG consumption for cooking. Whether it can provide all the required cooking energy depends upon digester size, feedstock availability, operating temperature, household demand and plant performance.

Can biogas be put into cylinders like LPG?

Gas derived from biogas can be stored in cylinders, but this should not be confused with simply filling an LPG cylinder with raw biogas. Producing compressed biomethane requires gas cleaning, upgrading, compression and suitable certified high-pressure equipment. It is a specialised process requiring appropriate safety standards.

Why is biogas important in agriculture?

Agriculture can supply manure and other suitable organic feedstocks for anaerobic digestion. The resulting biogas can provide useful energy, while digestate can return nutrients to agricultural land, creating a more circular farming system.

Why is biogas important for energy security?

Biogas is commonly produced from organic resources available within a country or locality. Greater use of such domestic resources can diversify energy supply and reduce some exposure to disruptions affecting internationally traded fossil fuels.

Conclusion: Biogas Is About More Than Renewable Energy

The importance of biogas is easy to underestimate if it is regarded simply as another way of generating renewable electricity.

Its wider value comes from connecting systems that are normally considered separately.

Waste becomes energy. Manure becomes fuel and fertiliser. Food waste becomes heat, electricity or renewable gas. Sewage treatment can produce energy. A household can potentially produce cooking gas, while an industrial-scale plant can supply biomethane to a national gas network.

And in a world newly reminded of the vulnerability of international energy supply chains, another characteristic has become increasingly valuable:

much of the resource needed to make biogas is already available locally.

That is why biogas can matter simultaneously to a large city, a commercial farm, a food manufacturer and a rural household—and why its role in future energy systems deserves to be considered not only in terms of decarbonisation, but also in terms of resilience and energy security.

References and Further Reading

• International Energy Agency – Outlook for Biogas and Biomethane
• International Energy Agency – Where in the World Is Biogas? A New IEA Tool Maps Its Potential
• Government of India, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy – Biogas Programme
• Government of India – Small and Medium Biogas Programme Information
• Government of India – Biogas Programme FAQs

Editor's note: This article was originally published in 2018 to discuss the importance of biogas to large cities and rural villages. It was substantially rewritten and updated in September 2026 to reflect developments in anaerobic digestion and biomethane, household biogas applications and the growing importance of energy security and resilience.

[First Published: 30 June 2018. Updated 25 June 2022. Rewritten and updated in September 2026.]