Doug Stewart, chief executive of Green Energy, claims green gas is 15 years behind renewable electricity – but is poised for stellar growth in the UK. Stewart believes the green gas industry is now poised for the same rollercoaster growth journey. In April his firm became the first company in the UK energy market to supply only renewable green gas to its residential and business customers, a move it claims makes it the only supplier to provide both renewable electricity and renewable gas as standard. The firm has been selling natural gas to its customers since 2014, and from the outset was keeping a close eye on the bio-methane market. But the offer of 100 per cent green gas – even for a small company like Green Energy, with around 25,000 customers – was not possible even two years ago, Stewart says. “We couldn’t buy it commercially – everyone wanted a premium in 2014. Just like everyone wanted a premium in 2001,” he says. “But we stuck with it, we built our knowledge of gas up, and there is sufficient gas now for us to supply our customers. There are now 200 AD plants operating on farms across the UK, which Stewart estimates is enough to supply around 100,000 homes with green gas. By 2035, the government plans for green gas generation to have increased 10-fold. “We are the beginning of another renewables revolution,” Stewart says. “I look back at the last 15 years, and what we do is now mainstream. People buy green electricity from all sorts of different people now, and people understand what green electricity is.” Once people become more familiar with the concept of “green gas” it will start to garner the same kind of market traction as solar or wind electricity, he predicts.
Business Green 28th June 2016 read more »