Greenlane Renewables to provide turnkey biogas upgrading as a service in Europe

Greenlane Renewables Inc. is pleased to announce that it has signed a definitive joint venture agreement with SWEN Impact Fund for Transition (SWEN), a European fund dedicated to renewable gases managed by SWEN Capital Partners based in Paris, France, with the purpose of providing biogas upgrading as a service (UaaS) to developers and owners of renewable natural gas (RNG) projects in Europe. The joint venture company, called Greenlane Biogas Finance B.V., will remove the burden of ownership on Greenlane’s clients by allowing them to replace initial capital outlays with a monthly fee. With capital provided by SWEN, this joint venture is expected to accelerate deployment of Greenlane’s biogas upgrading systems and assist in the decarbonization of the gas sector in Europe. This finalizes the agreement in principle announced on Jan. 28, 2020.

Under the collaboration, Greenlane’s market presence, technical expertise, customer contacts and industry experience is combined with SWEN’s investment expertise and financial backing as a leader in sustainable infrastructure investments with nearly €5 billion in assets under management. SWEN will provide capital to the joint venture for the building and owning of the biogas upgrading systems and will hold a majority share of the joint venture. Greenlane will hold a minority share and will identify prospective customers through its extensive pipeline of opportunities, supply the biogas upgrading systems at its normal commercial margins and provide long term operation and maintenance of the equipment. Additionally, under the agreement Greenlane has the option to invest in the joint venture to increase its ownership stake to increase its exposure to recurring revenue and profits. Potential customers include project developers and owners of anaerobic digestion plants or landfills having an interest in the injection of biomethane into the gas grid, while keeping initial costs down and getting peace of mind from uptime guarantees.

“We’ve created an innovative structure with SWEN that allows for scalable deployment of our biogas upgrading systems,” said Brad Douville, president and CEO of Greenlane. “This agreement gives more evidence of the maturation of the RNG industry and the global interest in the financing of these projects. With better access to specialized capital, global technical expertise and technology, we expect this initiative will help accelerate and scale up RNG projects across Europe, and allow developers and owners of landfills and anaerobic digestion plants to join the RNG industry with confidence and more certainty of success.”

“We believe Greenlane’s expertise and SWEN’s financial resources creates a powerful combination that will immediately bring to life a creative new solution to the European biogas market,” said Olivier Aubert, managing director of SWEN. “As European economies are slowly emerging from the COVID-19 pandemic, the European Commission has released a recovery plan for the EU that will focus on the Union’s Green Deal initiatives, which include a growing emphasis on renewable and decarbonized gases. We are seeing very strong growth in the number of biomethane facilities in Europe, which have increased 51 per cent since 2018, and see material upside potential for RNG within the European transportation sector. Although individual countries within the EU are at different stages of decarbonization, the overall momentum of RNG and the green energy transition is accelerating.”

With the definitive joint venture agreement in place, Greenlane will now formally launch UaaS in the European biogas market, with the goal of accelerating the implementation of renewable natural gas projects in Europe.