Governance for securing feedstock supply of biogas plants

Abstract

As stocks of fossil fuels become harder to access and exploit worldwide, renewable energies as a sustainable option have entered the limelight in recent years. Bio-energy plays an essential role in the current mix of renewable energy technologies. In Germany, the state fosters insistently biogas technology within the concert of bio-energy options. Literature suggests that long-term stable economic ties with supplying farmers are the pivotal managerial challenge of bio-energy plant operators to secure a constant and competitively priced feedstock supply. Biogas plant operators are generally in a vulnerable position vis-a-vis their suppliers due to their substantial specific capital investment and a rather restricted economically viable catchment area. Transactional uncertainty due to volatile agricultural market prices, changing yield quantities, and unpredictable behaviour of suppliers makes biogas plant operators aim for effective governance. The study aims by means of in-depth interviews to explore how ...