Good practice:

Normandy Biogas Production Plan – technical committee for project appraisal

Normandy has the potential to develop biogas projects but is lagging behind at a national level. To encourage the development of feasible projects, the Normandy Region and ADEME have established the Normandy Biogas Production Plan (Plan Méthanisation Normandie - PMN). Areas of focus (information, raising awareness, acceptability, support for project leaders) include the question of optimising project funding. In particular, public funding bodies need to secure funding commitments, some of which are European (ERDF), for projects which are not likely to be blocked or declared not to be feasible.
A PMN technical committee has been set up. It meets three times a year. It aims to share information on projects and their feasibility in regulatory, technical and financial terms to provide each stakeholder involved with the project’s feasibility and implementation with more security.
The PMN technical committee consists of the following parties: Normandy Region – ADEME – State departments (DREAL, DRAAF, DDT, etc.) – Territoire d’Energies Normandie (energy trade unions) – Private banks – Public banks – GRTgaz – GRDF – Normandy Biogas Production Plan operators.
The beneficiaries are the project leaders and public funding bodies working within the comitology process for the allocation of public subsidies.

Overall, the PMN costs €546.720 over three years. But this practice only occupies public and private stakeholders’ time.

Since PMN, the number of projects has increased sharply leading to difficulties (availability of public funding). This plan thus helps to optimise the use of public funds and to allocate them to viable projects, avoiding setting aside public money for projects which may face challenges. It also helps to identify difficulties with the projects and solutions to these difficulties.
Since mid-2018, 30 projects assessed, 16 already approved for funding ; 3 will be approved by mid 2020.

The inclusion and participation of the private banking sector still needs improvement. Some regional stakeholders participate, others don’t. There is limited capacity for reviewing projects because of a high number of projects currently being submitted.

In France, this practice has not been well developed, often because of sporadic or absent relationships between stakeholders. Discussions, exchanges of information and reviews of projects received during the funding phase or in advance all help to strengthen their analysis and to secure their funding (funding is only committed for viable projects, funding is optimised and prioritised). For the banking sector, this makes it possible to make public funding (regional, national and European) more reliable and to have information on a project’s regulatory elements. Public funding bodies are also able to access this regulatory information. This can sometimes provide the State with technical information obtained during meetings between project funders and project leaders. Overall, it helps to optimise each stakeholder’s time within this feasibility/funding chain. Problems when it comes to local acceptance can also be shared.