IEA Report Highlights Rapid Growth in the Global Biogas Industry
The IEA released its latest renewable energy market report, Renewables 2025, on 7 October 2025, highlighting that biogas and biomethane are becoming an integral part of the renewable energy success story. They are emerging as strategic fuels for decarbonising sectors that electricity alone cannot easily reach, such as heavy industry, long-haul transport, and heating. While they are not delivering the scale of solar PV and wind, they offer much-needed system benefits of flexibility, storage, base load, and dispatchability. This makes them indispensable in the context of the global energy transition.
The report includes, for the first time, a comprehensive chapter on biogas and biomethane, emphasising an updated forecast of industry growth – global production of biogas and biomethane is expected to increase by 22% between 2025 and 2030, representing a 4% upward revision in the 2030 outlook compared to last year’s forecast.
The sector experienced significant growth between 2021 and 2023. The table below highlights key regulations that influenced this expansion across major markets and how they continue to be enforced (Table 1: Biogas and biomethane policies and rules from key markets).
Europe is experiencing a shift from directly using biogas to upgrading it into biomethane (see image below). To achieve the European Union’s 35 bcm target by 2030, the growth of biomethane must increase substantially. By 2030, the EU is expected to reach only 27% if it focuses solely on biomethane.
Elsewhere, especially in markets with limited gas pipeline infrastructure, including major players such as China, India and Brazil, using biogas directly for electricity and CHP production continues to drive substantial growth in the sector.
India’s biogas and CBG production is expected to increase by 21% by 2030, approximately 20 PJ higher than earlier estimates. Both India and Brazil have ambitious blending mandates, which are likely to lead to further growth in adoption and investments.
See below for a breakdown of the potential for biogas production as presented in the report (Table 2: Regional biogas and biomethane potential breakdown).
Tripling renewable energy generation remains unattainable under the current trajectory, highlighting the urgency to adopt readily available renewable technologies, such as biogas. Dr Fatih Birol emphasised during the report launch that “the pace of growth of renewables will be determined by governments”.
WBA continues to promote government and private sector investment in the sector and advocates for best practices to maximise the economic, social, and environmental performance of biogas projects.
Regional trends and forecasts
| Country | Region | IEA’sForecast | Local Targets and Potential |
| Europe | 24 bcm (68% of the EU’s 35 bcm target) by 2030 |
| United States | 30 bcm (160% the 18.75 bcm production from 2023) by 2030* |
| China | 13 bcm (65% of China’s 20 bcm target) by 2030 |
| India | 115 bcm |
| Brazil | 102 bcm (120% of Brazil’s own 84.6 bcm potential) |
*ABC reports 1.4 million standard cubic feet per minute (scfm) of biogases produced in 2024, 10% more than 2023 (1.26 million scfm). A 2023 production of nearly 1.26 million scfm = 18.75 billion cubic metres (bcm).
Table 2: Regional biogas and biomethane potential breakdown