Arla erects Victorian Sewer Lamp near UK Parliament to boost attention on RNG

In the UK, last week a replica Victorian Sewer Lamp was erected near Parliament Square to draw attention to the untapped potential of biogas derived from cow poo and food waste as a renewable energy source.

After the Government at the end of March announced a major new strategy to deliver energy security and net zero, the UK’s biggest dairy cooperative Arla is drawing attention to this often overlooked source of cleaner energy, calling for a new plan to harness its potential to power the UK’s homes and businesses.

Tapping into biogas was once a staple of Victorian Britain after Birmingham engineer, Joseph Edmund Webb, patented a sewer gas destructor lamp fuelled by emissions from London’s sewers. Today we can once again harness the power of poo to help solve the UK’s energy security crisis with a nationwide strategy for anaerobic digestion of farm and food waste.

Arla is calling for a new national anaerobic digestion strategy incorporating larger community-based facilities generating biogases that can be fed into the gas grid or used in transport, and small scale digesters creating energy for use on farm. It is also championing better and more affordable grid connections to facilitate an anaerobic digestion revolution and at the same time help more farmers install solar power and other renewables.