How to Generate Biogas from Waste

Biogas is produced when anaerobic microorganisms — organisms that thrive in the absence of oxygen — break down organic matter inside a sealed digester. Manure, food waste, crop residue and other organic material can all serve as feedstock.

The digestion process yields a methane-rich gas that can be used directly for cooking and heating, or converted into electricity and lighting through a generator or fuel cell — making it especially useful on farms that already produce large volumes of organic waste as a by-product of normal operations.

A second, often underappreciated output of the process is the leftover digestate: a nutrient-rich material that can be applied to fields as fertiliser, closing the loop between waste, energy and crop production on the same site.

For agribusiness operations already generating manure and crop residue at scale, biogas offers a way to turn a waste-management cost into an energy and fertiliser input — a combination DOSARAF continues to evaluate across its own farm and processing sites.