Towards a standardization of biomethane potential tests: a commentary

Inter-laboratory reproducibility of biomethane potential (BMP) is dismal, with differences in BMP values for the same sample exceeding a factor of two in some cases. A large group of BMP researchers directly addressed this problem during a workshop held in Leysin, Switzerland, in June 2015. The workshop resulted in a new set of guidelines for BMP tests published in 2016, which is the subject of the present commentary. The work has continued with two international inter-laboratory studies and one additional workshop held in Freising, Germany, in 2018. The dataset generated by the two inter-laboratory studies were used to refine the validation criteria for BMP tests. Based on these new results an update to the original guidelines is proposed here.

Automated summary

The inter-laboratory reproducibility of the biomethane potential (BMP) has been historically poor, but efforts to address this issue through international studies and workshops have led to improvements in validation criteria for BMP tests. These new results have prompted the proposal of an update to the original guidelines.