EIF Commits €200 Million to Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners to Scale European Biomethane Production

The European Investment Fund has committed €200 million to Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners' Advanced Bioenergy Fund II, officially launching the fund with a cornerstone investment backed by the European Union's InvestEU and REPowerEU initiatives. ABF II targets a total size of €1.5 billion and will invest primarily in the development, construction and operation of new industrial-scale biogas plants using anaerobic digestion technology across Denmark, Ireland, Spain, Belgium and Finland. The fund will convert feedstock such as manure and agricultural waste into biomethane capable of decarbonising sectors including industry and maritime transport, addressing hard-to-abate emission sources that cannot be electrified through current commercial technology.

 

The ABF II Investment Strategy

 

ABF II focuses on greenfield projects, providing a differentiated pipeline of new bioenergy developments with clear visibility on how and when capital will be invested and projects delivered. The strategy builds on the success of CIP's first Advanced Bioenergy Fund and reflects growing investor confidence in biomethane as a key enabler of Europe's energy transition and energy security objectives. Biomethane is fully compatible with existing gas infrastructure, allowing newly produced renewable gas to be injected directly into the European grid without requiring separate distribution networks.

Thomas Dalsgaard, Partner at CIP and head of the advanced bioenergy team, said the EIF investment is an important step on the path toward the €1.5 billion target and that strong market demand for domestic biomethane production positions CIP well to deliver. The fund benefits from CIP's existing portfolio of greenfield bioenergy projects, providing an operational track record that supports investor confidence in the team's execution capability. With more than €37 billion raised and projects in more than 30 countries, CIP brings the institutional credibility and sector expertise that large-scale fund targets require.

 

Read more: Schroders Greencoat Acquires Dutch Biomethane Platform APF Energy to Scale European Renewable Gas

 

EIF's Strategic Rationale and European Policy Alignment

 

Merete Clausen, EIF Deputy Chief Executive, said the investment reflects Europe's growing focus on renewable gases and sustainable energy infrastructure, and that by supporting new biogas projects across Europe the EIF is helping increase domestic renewable energy production, strengthen energy security and accelerate the green transition. The EIF commitment is backed by the InvestEU programme, which provides long-term EU funding by leveraging public and private capital for strategic priorities including the European Green Deal. The REPowerEU backing further anchors the investment within Europe's response to energy import dependency, a concern significantly intensified by geopolitical disruptions in recent years.

The combination of public cornerstone capital from the EIF with private institutional co-investment reflects the blended finance architecture that characterises the EIB Group's approach to mobilising capital for the green transition. By taking a cornerstone position, the EIF de-risks the fundraising process for ABF II and signals institutional quality to potential private investors evaluating the fund. This crowding-in effect is a central policy objective of both InvestEU and REPowerEU, which collectively target the mobilisation of hundreds of billions in additional private investment through EU budget guarantees.

 

Biomethane's Role in European Energy Security

 

Europe's dependence on imported fossil gas has created strategic vulnerability that biomethane is uniquely positioned to address, given that it can be produced domestically from widely available agricultural feedstocks and injected into the existing gas network. The EU's biomethane production target of 35 billion cubic metres by 2030 under the REPowerEU plan requires a significant acceleration of new plant development, which funds such as ABF II are designed to deliver. Sectors including industry and maritime transport that cannot readily electrify depend particularly heavily on gas as an energy carrier, making a credible supply of renewable gas critical to their decarbonisation pathways.

Countries including Denmark, Ireland, Spain, Belgium and Finland, where ABF II will focus, combine strong agricultural feedstock availability with supportive national regulatory frameworks and established gas infrastructure. These regulatory environments provide the long-term revenue visibility that infrastructure investors require to commit development capital to projects with multi-year construction timelines. CIP's focus on markets with mature regulatory frameworks reduces execution risk and improves the predictability of project returns across the fund's anticipated investment period.

 

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Outlook for European Biogas Infrastructure Investment

 

The EIF commitment to ABF II reinforces a broader institutional trend in which European development finance institutions are increasing their support for advanced bioenergy as a complement to wind and solar in the renewable energy mix. As the EU moves toward its 2030 biomethane targets, the gap between current production and the required scale represents a substantial investment opportunity for specialist fund managers with proven development capabilities. The combination of EU policy tailwinds, strong feedstock availability across European agricultural regions and growing corporate demand for renewable gas certificates is creating structurally favourable conditions for the biomethane investment category.

Whether ABF II can reach its €1.5 billion target and deploy capital effectively across its greenfield pipeline will depend on continued regulatory support in target markets, feedstock supply reliability and the pace of permitting and grid connection approvals. Sustained execution would establish CIP's advanced bioenergy platform as one of the leading dedicated biomethane fund managers in Europe and demonstrate the commercial viability of industrial-scale biogas development at fund portfolio scale. The EIF cornerstone commitment provides a strong foundation from which to attract the private institutional capital needed to complete the fundraise.

 

Source: GLOBE NEWSWIRE