CHINA - During the 11th Five-Year Plan period, the central government has spent RMB 21.2 billion yuan on the development of biogas in rural areas

This investment has helped the rapid development of the rural biogas industry, raising the number of biogas users and improving the investment structure, service system and functions of biogas.

At the same time, multiple supply patterns have taken shape as the biogas industry developed, including systems for rural households, animal farms, animal farming communities and group biogas users, middle and primary schools.
The investment has also helped centralised supply by making use of straw and stalks to generate biogas.
A rural biogas industrial system, covering equipment, construction, science and technology and service, has been preliminarily established.
There have also been major breakthroughs in the technology using straw and stalks for biogas generation, automation of biogas engineering control, power generation with biogas, and in CDM of biogas projects.
According to statistics from the Ministry of Agriculture of China (MOA), by the end of 2010, biogas was expected to be supplied to an estimate of 40 million farm households or 33 per cent of the national total with proper conditions for biogas use.
The number of biogas works was expected to exceed 60,000 (including over 20,000 small-scale units such as those for animal farming communities and more than 4700 medium and large-sized plants), benefiting 155 million people.
The ministry says that the biogas industry will continue to grow in scale with the number of biogas workers and production/service enterprises exceeding 270,000 and 4000 respectively and its annual output value topping RMB 26 billion yuan.
The ministry says that rural biogas, closely connected with crop and animal farming as well as farmers’ daily life, has remarkable comprehensive benefits, not only providing high-quality energy for their daily life and optimising the energy-consumption structure, but also reducing greenhouse gas emissions and promoting the development of low-carbon economy.
The annual output of biogas in rural areas has amounted to 16.4 billion m3 (about 13 percent of national yearly consumption of natural gas) which could equal nearly 18.4 million tons of standard coal and help to reduce CO₂ by over 50 million tons, helping to meet the national control targets of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
In rural areas, nearly 400 million tons of organic fertilisers could be produced during biogas generation.
Ecological cycle models such as “pig farming-biogas generation-fruit (vegetables, grain and tea) production” and some supporting measures could help reduce the use of pesticides and fertilisers by over 20 percent, improve 80 million mu (5.33 million ha) of farmland, raise the quality of agricultural products and promote the development of eco-friendly animal farming and high-efficient crop farming.
Incomplete statistics show that biogas construction and service branches could generate nonagricultural job opportunities for more than 300,000 farmers every year.
Forty million household biogas tanks could save more than RMB 40 billion yuan in total, counting cost reduction by RMB 1,000 yuan on fuel, electricity and fertiliser per tank.
During the period of the 11th Five-Year Plan, household biogas works have brought additional 8.8 billion yuan to farmers’ wage income.
Meanwhile, rural biogas works will play a more significant role in developing “high-yield, high-quality, high-efficiency, eco-friendly and safe” modern agriculture, eliminating the source of infection and reducing the incidence of diseases.