Ferrero’s Simona Amerio highlights industry’s pathway to scale biomethane for decarbonisation

Simona Amerio, who leads operations sustainability, environment and energy regulatory & ISO systems at Ferrero Group, will set out the confectionery firm’s expectations for scaling biomethane when she speaks at the 2026 International Biogas Congress & Expo, according to bioenergy-news. Her remarks underscore how large manufacturers are weighing bioenergy against competing decarbonisation options and what industry and policymakers must deliver for offtakers to commit at scale.

Ferrero treats decarbonisation as a business-centred programme that blends energy efficiency, electrification and renewable fuels with responsible sourcing and circularity, according to the company briefing. Within that mix, bioenergy and biomethane are positioned not as a universal fix but as a targeted tool for industrial thermal loads or locations where electrification remains impractical. “Rather than viewing bioenergy as a transitional solution, we see it as a complementary decarbonisation lever, especially when it is based on waste or by-products and embedded in circular value chains,” Amerio said.

The message is practical. According to bioenergy-news, Amerio will stress that corporate demand for biomethane is present, but firms will only sign up to projects that can demonstrate technical soundness, regulatory clarity and verified sustainability. “The key message is that demand for biomethane exists, but it must be supported by projects that are robust from a technical, regulatory, and sustainability standpoint,” she said. Ferrero applies a multi-disciplinary appraisal to potential bioenergy deals, weighing lifecycle emissions, feedstock origin, operational reliability and commercial durability before committing supply or offtake contracts. “We prioritise projects that are based on waste or residual feedstocks, avoid competition with food systems, and demonstrate clear lifecycle emissions benefits,” Amerio explained.

Those criteria mirror wider tensions in the sector. Industry analysts and programme designers are targeting dramatic expansion: the European Commission’s Biomethane Industrial Partnership has set an ambition of roughly 35 billion cubic metres of biomethane per year by 2030, a scale that market commentators say will require tens of billions of euros of investment and thousands of new plants. According to Macquarie analysis, achieving the EU objective could demand around €83 billion and some 5,000 facilities by the end of the decade. That ambition highlights the gulf between corporate demand and the practicalities of feedstock supply, permitting, grid injection and financing.

Real-world projects show both the potential and the constraints. CycleØ’s plant in Catalonia, which processes industrial and commercial organic waste to produce biomethane for grid injection, demonstrates how waste-to-gas installations can serve local circular-economy goals while displacing fossil gas. At the same time, corporate initiatives such as Unilever’s plan to source biomethane from palm-oil waste in Indonesia illustrate how large manufacturers can secure substantial volumes to decarbonise high-emitting sites when supply chains and feedstocks are reliably organised.

For consumer goods companies that operate global supply chains, factors beyond pure carbon accounting matter. Ferrero’s recent sustainability reporting highlights the scale of its challenge: Scope 3 emissions make up the vast majority of its footprint, and the group has been pursuing packaging circularity and transport pilots, testing bio-LNG and electric trucks, to reduce logistical emissions. Industry progress on packaging and transport demonstrates a willingness to experiment with low-carbon fuels, but translating pilots into repeatable, cross-border programmes depends on standardised sustainability criteria, traceability systems and stable commercial terms.

Amerio and other industrial offtakers call for closer cooperation along the value chain. According to bioenergy-news, she sees the conference as an opportunity to encourage standardisation and transparency, and to press technology providers and regulators for replicable business models that reduce complexity for multinational buyers. For large manufacturers, supply security, clear contractual terms and consistent regulatory frameworks across jurisdictions are prerequisites for scaling biomethane from niche projects into core energy supply.

The implications for policymakers and developers are clear: if corporates are to accelerate uptake, projects must deliver demonstrable lifecycle emissions reductions, avoid adverse land-use or food-competition outcomes, and offer long-term price and delivery certainty. Industry data and recent corporate pilots show those conditions can be met in particular geographies and feedstock streams, but bridging the gap to the volumes targeted by public partnerships will require coordinated investment, streamlined permitting and widely accepted sustainability safeguards.

Amerio’s intervention will highlight that for offtakers the decision to adopt biomethane is as much about risk management and operational fit as it is about emissions math. By setting out the offtaker perspective, Ferrero aims to influence the market signals that developers and regulators must send if biomethane is to move from a collection of pilots to a scalable component of industrial decarbonisation strategies.