Draft auctions for biomethane above 1 MW: capacity segments, import cap and costs to 2034

Detailed assumptions of the Polish auction system for biomethane were described in a review of the draft amendment published on 25 February 2025. The draft amended the act on investments in wind power plants and certain other acts, and for biomethane introduced support through auctions for installations with a capacity above 1 MW. It is the first such detailed description of the design of biomethane auctions in Poland.

Design of the system

According to the review:

• Scope: biomethane from biogas or agricultural biogas, produced from feedstocks meeting the sustainability criteria; installations up to 1 MW remain in the FIP system.
• Electrical capacity segments: below 2 MW, 2–6 MW and above 6 MW.
• Age of equipment: new or manufactured no earlier than 48 months before the first production of biomethane.
• Certificate: before taking part in an auction, the producer must obtain from the President of the Energy Regulatory Office (URE) a certificate of meeting the conditions.
• Foreign participants: foreign producers may bid on a reciprocity basis (condition: the physical possibility of feeding gas into the Polish grid); imports are to account for at most 5% of the annual auction volume.
• Authorities: auctions are conducted by the President of URE, the Council of Ministers sets the volume and value, and the Minister of Climate sets the annual reference price per MWh.
• Schedule: auctions at least once a year, with volumes set in three-year periods.

According to the regulatory impact assessment, by 2030 about 53 installations with an average capacity of 2.8 MW would be built, producing up to 300 million m³ of biomethane a year. The costs of support were to reach nearly PLN 1.3 billion a year from 2034 and to be financed mainly from the RES fee.

Significance for the industry in Poland

The proposed thresholds and segments are a fairly clear pointer for designers: the largest group of installations would be 2–6 MW, and so would fall within the scale of an agricultural biomethane plant fed with slurry and agricultural residues. The import limit of 5% is meant to protect domestic industry, but would require confirmation of compatibility with EU rules on the free movement of goods. For investors, the 48-month age limit on equipment is also important, as it eliminates the "re-plugging" of used installations.

It is worth remembering that these were assumptions of a draft, not binding law. Details may change in the course of the legislative work.

What next

The draft also contains regulations on wind turbines, so its fate depends on the dispute over the distance of turbines from buildings. The biogas industry fears that combining the two topics will delay the biomethane provisions. Investors should follow the work in the Sejm and the comments submitted by URE, as well as the regulatory impact assessments, which will show what reference prices and volumes projects in the individual capacity segments can count on.