Industry background

Bioenergy in India, from village biogas to national mandate.

Four decades of policy turned biomass from a rural cooking-fuel programme into a structural part of India’s energy mix — the same policy shift that put biocoal, pellets and briquettes on industrial buyers’ shortlists. Here’s how it got there.

• 1981–82The National Project on Biogas Development (NPBD) is launched — India’s first major bioenergy programme, subsidizing family-size biogas plants across rural India.
• 1982Biogas is added to the Prime Minister’s 20-Point Programme and placed under the newly formed Department of Non-Conventional Energy Sources (DNES).
• 1992DNES is upgraded into a full central ministry — the Ministry of Non-Conventional Energy Sources (MNES) — and begins the Biomass Power & Bagasse Cogeneration Programme, backing India’s first grid-connected biomass power plants.
• 2002–03NPBD is restructured into the National Biogas and Manure Management Programme (NBMMP).
• 2006MNES is renamed the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE) — the name it still carries today.
• 2018The National Policy on Biofuels is notified, setting ethanol-blending and biodiesel targets, and the Biomass-based Cogeneration Programme is relaunched under MNRE.
• Oct 2018The SATAT scheme is launched by the Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas, targeting 5,000 Compressed Biogas (CBG) plants producing 15 million tonnes a year.
• 2019The Pradhan Mantri JI-VAN Yojana is launched, funding second-generation (2G) ethanol plants that run on crop residue and other lignocellulosic biomass.
• Oct 2021The Ministry of Power issues India’s first biomass co-firing policy, asking coal-fired power stations to blend biomass pellets into their fuel.
• May 2022The National Policy on Biofuels is amended, moving the 20% ethanol-blending target up from 2030 to 2025-26 and widening the eligible feedstock list.
• Nov 2022MNRE notifies the National Bioenergy Programme, unifying Waste-to-Energy, Biomass and Biogas support under a single Phase-I outlay of ₹858 crore.
• Jun 2023The biomass co-firing policy is revised into a firm mandate — 5% co-firing from FY2024-25, rising to 7% from FY2025-26.
• 2024Crop-residue burning penalties under the CAQM Act are raised to as much as ₹30,000 per incident, and the Pradhan Mantri JI-VAN Yojana is extended to 2028-29 with an expanded feedstock list.
• Aug 2026The Union Cabinet approves GOBARdhan, a ₹23,731 crore unified national scheme for Compressed Biogas (FY2026-27–FY2035-36) that folds SATAT and related CBG support into one framework.

Figures and dates above are drawn from public sources — the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy (MNRE), Ministry of Power, Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas and the Press Information Bureau, Government of India — and are current as of September 2026. Scheme outlays, targets and timelines are revised from time to time; see our policy & regulations page for the rules currently in force, or check the source ministry’s official notifications before relying on this for a compliance or investment decision.