Report Shows Targeting Food and Manure Waste and Oil and Gas Production Could Cut Methane Emissions 30 Percent by 2030: Part 1

The window to meaningfully bend the curve on climate change is shortening, prompting countries around the world to figure out how to cut their planet-warming methane emissions in hopes of making big impact, and as quickly as possible.

This two-part series explores potential to drastically reduce methane release by focusing on three top emitters: food waste, farm manure, and oil and gas production. Read on for an in-depth comparison of cost and impact of various measures targeting each of these sources, with a focus on anaerobic digestion on the organics front, and on new emissions-mitigation measures imposed on the oil and gas sector.

The U.S., like the rest of the world, is struggling to deliver on its Global Methane Pledge to cut methane emissions by 30 percent by 2030. This potent greenhouse gas is responsible for about one-third of global warming, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA)—

and reaching the 2030 reduction target is critical to preventing the earth’s heating from accelerating to uncontrollable magnitude, say climate scientists.

A new Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule clamping down on the oil and gas industry’s methane emissions could get the U.S. just over halfway to 30 percent by 2030. Reducing methane from food waste and agricultural waste via anaerobic digestion (AD) could take the country the rest of the way, and is the most impactful and cost-effective option for cutting methane from organic waste, according to a new report by nonprofit Energy Vision.

An added benefit of AD is that the captured biogas could be used to generate power or upgraded to renewable natural gas (RNG), which when made from food discards or farm manure, is net carbon negative.

But 4,700 plants would need to come online by 2030 for AD

to pick up where the oil and gas sector emissions-cutting measures would leave off. That would mean working at an unprecedented rate to build out infrastructure, and at a cost of about $74B, Energy Vision’s report concludes.

Just shy of 2,000 ADs run in the U.S. today, some at relatively low capacity, and most of them process sewage from wastewater treatment plants. Mass scaling of farm manure and food waste plants is a huge and costly undertaking. Figuring out how to sort and process municipal food waste especially remains a hurdle.

But Michael Lerner, Energy Vision’s director of research and publications and report author, is optimistic about the potential to scale for significant near-term impact.

“The technology is already commercial, and feedstocks are abundant. Though there’s a lack of awareness, and there needs to be more government incentives and clarity around those incentives to see the buildout of ADs that the country needs,” he says

The Inflation Reduction Act has many such incentives, but the government has been slow in providing specific details on eligibility, Lerner says.

“Still, ADs can be built in two to six years, meaning they can realistically help us reach 30 percent reduction by 2030,” he concludes.

Energy Vision’s report calculates and compares the estimated capital expenditure (CaPex) and avoided emissions of various methane-abating measures for both organics and oil and gas production.

On the organics management front, the report names diverting food waste from landfills to anaerobic digesters as “the biggest bang for the buck” (greatest impact at the lowest cost). Municipal solid waste landfills are the nation’s third-largest source of human-related methane emissions, and food waste accounts for most of those emissions.

The report calls out cow and swine manure ADs as the second “biggest bang” to mitigate methane from organics. Targeting both food waste and farm animal manures would achieve a 13.6 percent emissions reduction. That’s on top of the estimated 17.5 percent that the oil and gas industry could achieve yearly if it complies with EPA’s New Source Performance Standards, which took effect in May 2024.

For a breakdown of the numbers, building about 680 AD plants to process municipal and industrial food waste would reduce total U.S. emissions by 7.5 percent for a CapEx of about $31.7B. Those 680 ADs would annually cut about half of landfill methane emissions from 2020 levels and cut 1,752 metric tons of methane per million dollars of infrastructure investment. 

Building about 4,000 more ADs to process dairy and swine manure would cut U.S. methane by another 6.1 percent at an estimated CapEx of $42.5B. It would cut three quarters of dairy and swine manure methane emissions per year and translate to approximately 1,068 metric tons of methane reduction per million dollars of investment.

Combined, the roughly 4,700 ADs would reduce over 12 times more methane than could be done by plugging all 2.1 million abandoned oil and gas wells in the U.S., at about half the estimated cost, according to Energy Vision’s report.

Though, other oil and gas sector measures would have more impact at less expense. The industry’s cumulative capital cost to comply with the NSPS is projected to be $20.7B, which by Energy Vision’s calculations comes to 6,280 metric tons of methane reduction per million dollars of CaPex invested (cheaper than AD as seen in the figures noted earlier).

In understanding cumulative impacts, it becomes clear that oil and gas, food and ag waste emissions mitigation measures must work together, the report concludes.  “Without both, the U.S. path to achieving the Global Methane Pledge would be nearly impossible,” Lerner says.

Ron Gonen founder & CEO, Closed Loop Partners, who wrote the report’s forward, confers, pointing out that methane leakage and flaring from oil and gas operations, outgassing from organic wastes, as well as methane released from enteric fermentation (cow belches) are the largest human-caused emissions.

“We only have a few years left to bend the curve sharply on methane emissions. We need to attack methane emissions on all fronts,” Gonen writes.

Composting can play a complementary role.

“Community composting provides benefits such as improved soil health, progress in landfill diversion, and greater citizen engagement. But these programs can typically only take fruits, vegetables, and yard wastes, and could handle just a small fraction of the enormous volume of inedible food waste that the U.S. produces,” the report states, though if sites are well aerated, they can cut methane emissions significantly compared to the baseline of landfilling food waste.

Larger, commercial-scale compost sites can also play a role. However, empirical data indicates they often produce as much methane as average landfills.

Ultimately, a good answer, Energy Vision concludes, is diverting most food waste to ADs, complemented by community and commercial compost facilities designed to efficiently manage both food and yard waste.

“Our focus on anaerobic digestion is by no means a suggestion that it is the only methane mitigation strategy,” Lerner says. “But it is among the most established and illustrates an important, broader point: much of the technology we need to address the climate challenge is commercial but under-deployed.”

The report shows that scaling ADs can make a big difference in cutting methane emissions, right up there among ambitious strategies to cut methane from oil and gas production, he contends.

“As we scale renewable energy solutions across the board, we also need the political will to prioritize building ADs as an essential piece of the puzzle.”