The Draft Law on the simplification of urban planning and environmental procedures in Catalonia – GENCAT – which has just been released for public consultation and comment, takes a significant step toward reducing one of the main obstacles to the development of new investments: the complexity and duration of administrative procedures. The proposal does not merely express the intention to simplify: it introduces specific deadlines, coordination mechanisms, and targeted measures for renewable energy and biogas.
The Generalitat de Catalunya is advancing a reform of urban planning and environmental processing based on a clear diagnosis. The preliminary report itself identifies “excessively slow and complex” procedures, successive processes that could be carried out concurrently, and a multiplicity of sectoral reports that do not always add value. It also acknowledges that these delays generate opportunity costs and may discourage investment.
The proposal therefore seeks to streamline and coordinate urban planning, environmental, and sectoral procedures, reduce duplication, and strengthen collaboration among the Administration, collaborating entities, and accredited professionals.
An approach especially relevant for renewable energy and also for the development of biogas and biomethane.
From the Intention to Simplify to Specific Deadlines
One of the most interesting elements of the proposal is that simplification is beginning to translate into defined administrative deadlines. According to the analysis conducted by APPA Renovables, for the authorization of wind farms and photovoltaic plants, the amendment to Decree-Law 16/2019 proposes:
- 1 month to verify that the submitted documentation is complete.
- 30 days for public consultation.
- 1 month for the issuance of reports by administrations, agencies, and public service companies.
- 3 months to issue the environmental impact statement or report from receipt of the complete file.
- 1 month for urban planning approval following environmental assessment.
In addition, a prior hearing for the developer of ten working days is established regarding the proposed environmental impact statement. Not all these deadlines are directly transferable to a biomethane plant, whose processing and environmental characteristics are different. But the regulatory philosophy is fully applicable: coordinated procedures, defined phases, and predictable administrative deadlines.
A Unified Review to Prevent the Procedure from Starting Over
There is another element that may be even more important than the formal reduction of deadlines: the obligation to consolidate into a single request the review or correction of documentation for each project.
In complex procedures, a significant portion of delays can occur when information requirements are made successively. Each new request for documentation can halt or prolong the file and hinder calendar predictability. Unifying this review requires a more coordinated analysis of the project and allows the developer to respond comprehensively. The measure aligns directly with the diagnosis made by the Generalitat itself, which identifies the succession of procedures and the multiplicity of sectoral reports as problems.
Simplification does not consist solely of reducing procedures. It also means preventing the same file from having to undergo successive administrative reviews when these can be carried out in a coordinated manner.
Biogas Also Incorporates Specific Advances
The reform also contains measures specifically relevant to our sector. According to the analysis by APPA Renovables, the Draft Bill considers biogas plants processing up to 100,000 tons per year of non-hazardous waste as technical services and permits on non-developable land plants that exclusively treat livestock manure and other agricultural organic materials.
The regime relating to the agricultural management plan for facilities treating livestock manure is also modified.
These are relevant measures because a significant portion of biogas and biomethane projects are necessarily linked to rural areas and proximity to the organic materials they valorize. In fact, the preliminary report itself acknowledges the need to adapt urban planning instruments to the particularities of rural municipalities through more flexible formulas proportionate to their socioeconomic reality.
Biomethane Is Already Expressly Part of the Debate
The public consultation process also incorporates an especially positive signal. The sector has proposed that Catalonia adopt for biogas and biomethane plants a model similar to that existing in Aragon: integrating within the Integrated Environmental Authorization procedure the environmental assessment and urban planning intervention necessary for facilities on non-developable land, and advancing toward a one-stop shop that centralizes urban planning documentation and other sectoral requirements.
The Generalitat’s response is significant: the proposal will be expressly evaluated to simplify the urban planning and environmental procedures for biogas and biomethane plants. It has also been proposed to integrate into the main project the urban planning and environmental procedures associated with the infrastructure necessary to connect renewable gas plants with transmission and distribution networks. The Generalitat shares the need to integrate procedures and simplify certain processes.
Therefore, the debate is no longer whether biomethane should be part of administrative simplification, but how far that simplification can go while maintaining all safeguards.
Simplification Does Not Mean Reducing Safeguards
The future regulation proposes to adjust the intensity of administrative control to the actual risk of each activity, reduce unnecessary procedures, improve coordination, and establish clearer and more predictable processes. But the Generalitat also makes clear that the reform does not intend to lower environmental standards or exclude from environmental assessment those projects that must be subject to it.
This balance between administrative agility and environmental rigor is precisely what biomethane needs. It is not about eliminating controls. It is about avoiding duplication, coordinating administrations, consolidating requirements, and establishing deadlines that make it possible to know when a file can reasonably be resolved.
The Next Step: Extending This Predictability to Biomethane
At IAM Carbonzero, we believe that Catalonia is moving in the right direction. The Draft Bill introduces specific measures for biogas while simultaneously developing for other renewable technologies an administrative model based on defined deadlines, coordination, simultaneous processing, and unified document review. The next step should be to progressively extend this same logic to all biogas and biomethane projects, adapting it to their specific characteristics.
This need also coincides with one of the sector’s main demands. APPA Biogás has been calling for a one-stop shop, simpler procedures, and a stable and homogeneous regulatory framework; its president has noted that processing a biomethane project can currently take between three and five years. (APPA Renovables).
The objective should therefore be coordinated urban planning and environmental procedures, concurrent processing where possible, an effective administrative one-stop shop, a single document review, predictable deadlines, and better integration of connection infrastructure. All without reducing environmental safeguards or public oversight.
Catalonia now has the opportunity to turn administrative simplification into a true energy and territorial policy tool.
Simplification does not mean requiring less. It means ensuring that what is necessary is processed once, in a coordinated manner, and within predictable deadlines.
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