Sustainability of farm biogas diffusion in Italy

This paper considers the diffusion of agricultural biogas installations in Italy as a treatment to plant-host municipalities; provided comparable farm features, non-adopters form the control group. The aim of the paper is to estimate the impact of spatial spillover from plant-host municipalities on neighbouring municipalities, to evaluate the contribution of farm biogas’ diffusion to the viability of rural areas. The methodology involves applying a spatial difference in differences model on a two-year panel. Data are from the last two Italian censuses of agriculture (2000 and 2010) and population (2001 and 2011), made available by ISTAT, the Italian statistical office; details about single biogas plants are from CRPA, the Italian research centre on animal production. Preliminary model results highlight that the diffusion of biogas across Italian municipalities impacts on farm number, utilised agricultural area, and livestock units of the neighbouring municipalities, which can result in increased intensification of agriculture and marginalisation of small farms.