We need a vision as to which direction we want to take with the fertilizer market

A lot of manure is needed to produce (a lot of) green gas. Applying other biomass together with manure causes extra digestate. What effects will this have on the future fertilizer market? The fertilizer market is already under heavy pressure. There must be a clear vision of which fertilizer market we want in our country. 

Half of the forecast 1,5 billion cubic meters of green gas around 2030 must come from manure fermentation. This is evident from the "Scenario study on green gas production around 2030" by the consultancy CE Delft and New Energy Coalition of March 2024. For 755 million cubic meters of green gas, around 40 million tons of manure must be fermented. About 3.500 dairy farms (> 200 dairy cows) can produce green gas themselves profitably. Smaller companies can organize this together in so-called biogas hubs. According to the authors of the scenario study, there is enough manure, even if manure production declines.

Import other raw materials
Enough other biomass from our own country for green gas may pose a problem. According to the scenario study, imports of bio-based raw materials should solve this problem. "A substantial part of the green gas will come from foreign bio-raw materials, especially in the (medium) large installations." Port locations on deep waters have been inventoried for the production installations.

An additional amount of digestate is created from imported raw materials after fermentation. This also happens if agricultural grass, energy, rest and rotational crops are also fermented as proposed in the scenario study. Although fermentation only concerns organic matter, imported raw materials and crops do provide an extra amount of digestate with nitrogen, phosphate, other nutrients and other substances.

Ideal market situation
An ideal market situation would be if large central digesters fermented the surplus manure from livestock farmers and largely processed the digestate into end products for sale outside the Dutch manure market. They also fulfill the processing obligation for livestock farmers. Another part of the digestate can then be processed into renure fertilizers to replace chemical fertilizers in agriculture.

Uncertain manure situation
But such an ideal fertilizer market is still a long way off. The manure situation is now extremely uncertain for livestock farmers. Will chaotic situations arise in livestock farming and the manure market in the next two years? This serves no one - not even the water quality -. How soon will there be more space for manure placement due to new manure measures in the outline agreement and will there be a grassland standard for cattle? These are all still unanswered questions.

Digestate no problem
Green gas producers will want certainty about a continuous supply of sufficient raw materials. If there is uncertainty about the future fertilizer situation, large green gas producers will be more likely to opt for importing other, more energy-rich raw materials. There is no brake on imports. The production of digestate has no production ceiling and no processing obligation. Replacing animal manure with digestate on the manure market is a hard blow for livestock farming. This will undoubtedly also have adverse effects on water quality. In the aforementioned scenario study, digestate does not play any role in realizing the green gas ambitions.

New manure measures and green gas ambitions require drawing up an integrated vision for the future of the manure market with an associated plan of action and planning. There is much to be said for putting the phasing out of the derogation and the reduction of the manure production ceilings "on hold".

Jaap Uenk

Jaap Uenk is the owner of consultancy Mestem and has more than 40 years of experience in various positions in the Dutch fertilizer sector.

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