Vitagro Group of Companies intends to reach the planned capacity of biomethane plant of 3 million cubic meters of biomethane per year in 2025 and in case of successful export is ready to build two more plants to increase production and export, the company’s development and investment director Sergiy Savchuk told Forbes Ukraina.
“We have several projects in the pipeline. Construction of one plant in Khmelnitsky region and another in Rivne region. However, we have not started construction yet, we have to evaluate the results of exports. If we are satisfied, we will quickly build new projects. The total capacity of the two new plants is about 8 million cubic meters of biomethane per year,” he said.
According to his information, the group of companies is considering the option of attracting foreign investors in capital.
He added that now 20 tons of cattle manure or 70-80 tons of slurry are used to produce 1000 cubic meters of biomethane at the plant in Khmelnitsky region.
Vitagro Group has its own cows and bulls – 5700 heads, pigs – 106 thousand heads, manure from which is the raw material for biomethane production. The plant has 20 employees, and 50 specialists were involved in the construction of the plant.
Savchuk suggested that EUR6 mln invested in the construction of the plant in Khmelnitsky region will pay off in five years, but everything will depend on the gas price. If the market continues to grow, EUR6 mln will be recouped faster. Now the cost of biomethane in the company is more than EUR500 per 1000 cubic meters. At the same time, the EU natural gas price is around EUR600 per 1,000 cubic meters as of mid-February 2025.
“Due to the high gas prices in the EU, biomethane is a premium market. We have seen the prospects. Another reason is risk diversification. Our own generation allows us to ensure the group’s energy independence, given the Russian Federation’s energy strikes,” emphasized the company’s development and investment director.
Preparing for the first export delivery of biomethane took the company’s team 5 months of work. Vitagro noted that the whole process of exporting biomethane was a challenge for them: from connecting to the grid, which took several months, injecting the biomethane, quality control to customs clearance and delivery to the border.
Vitagro Group of Companies has invested a total of about $50 million in the development of its projects since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, the company’s development and investment director Serhiy Savchuk said at the conference “Doing Agribusiness in Ukraine” in Kiev on Wednesday.
According to him, the main investments were made in the construction of a plant for the production of microfertilizers and plant protection products (PPP) Vitagro Partner, biomethane and bioethanol plants, as well as in increasing the capacity of the oil extraction plant.
Savchuk specified that about $8 million was spent on the construction of the Vitagro Partner plant and more than $6 million on the construction of the biomethane plant. The biomethane plant was the first in the country to be connected to the gas transportation system of Ukraine, and it has been pumping biomethane for export for the third month already.
Investments in the bioethanol plant totaled $20 million, while the expansion of the oil extraction plant’s capacity cost less than $15 million.
“Projects that were planned and developed already during the war. Vitagro Group felt that even in the conditions of war it is possible to work and develop new projects, so, for example, at the state auction bought a distillery in Ternopil region and now it produces 25 thousand tons of biomethane per year. In parallel, the production of protein feed additive for animals (DDGS) is launched, the capacity of which will be 25 thousand tons per year”, – said the representative of the company.
VITAGRO group of companies was established in 1999. In 2021, it employed 5 thousand employees, its revenue amounted to $211.3 million, EBITDA – $101 million.
The group has a land bank of 85,000 hectares. The group also has a seed and crop protection products plant, as well as sunflower oil production facilities and one of the five largest orchards in Ukraine. VITAGRO also has 5,000 head of cattle and 110,000 head of pigs, elevator capacity for 400,000 tons, as well as three brick factories and nine asphalt plants, four solar power plants with a total capacity of 16 MW.
The first pilot biomethane project of VITAGRO was presented in June 2023 in Dobrogorshcha village in Khmelnytsky district of Khmelnytsky region, where a biomethane plant with a capacity of 2.9 million cubic meters per year was built on the basis of a farm and a biogas plant. The investment in the project is estimated at EUR7.6 million. The manure, silage and straw from the group’s farms with pigs and cattle will be used for methane production.
According to the information in the Unified State Register of Legal Entities and Individual Entrepreneurs, the main beneficiary of Vitagro is MP Serhiy Labaziuk, while its CEO is Petro Labaziuk.
Vitagro Group will raise EUR110 million in additional investments to develop its biomethane plant in Khmelnytsky region and increase its capacity by 5 million cubic meters by the time biomethane production starts, said Serhiy Savchuk, Vitagro Group’s Director of Development and Investments, at the Ukraine Recovery Conference in Berlin on Wednesday.
“We understand that by 2030, 35 million cubic meters of biomethane will be consumed in the EU. That is why we have invested EUR6 million in our first biomethane plant in Ukraine. Yesterday I spoke with our customers in Europe who sell our product to the EU. I sent them a memorandum for additional investments in our biomethane plant,” he said.
According to Savchuk, it is an investment of EUR110 million, which will allow Vitagro to increase biomethane production by 5 million cubic meters per year.
Vitagro’s Director of Development and Investment also said that the group of companies has launched five projects at its own expense since the beginning of the full-scale war. Fertilizer production projects and a corn pellet ethanol plant have now been fully completed.
The VITAGRO group of companies was founded in 1999. In 2021, it employed 5 thousand people, its revenue amounted to $211.3 million, and EBITDA was $101 million.
The group’s land bank is 85 thousand hectares. The group also owns a seed and crop protection plant, as well as sunflower oil production facilities and one of the five largest orchards in Ukraine. VITAGRO also owns 5,000 heads of cattle and 110,000 heads of pigs, elevator capacity of 400,000 tons, as well as three brick factories and nine asphalt plants, and four solar power plants with a total capacity of 16 MW.
VITAGRO’s first pilot biomethane project was presented in June 2023 in Dobrohorscha village in Khmelnytskyi district of Khmelnytskyi region, where a biomethane plant with a capacity of 2.9 million cubic meters per year was built on the basis of a farm and a biogas plant, with investments in the project estimated at EUR 7.6 million. Manure, silage, and straw from the group’s pig and cattle farms will be used for methane production.
VITAGRO also planned to launch two more such plants: “Zorya in Rivne region for 3 million cubic meters and 52 thousand tons of fertilizers with an investment of EUR 7 million and in the former Volochysk district (now Khmelnytsky district) for 2.5 million cubic meters and 100 thousand tons of fertilizers with an investment of EUR 6.8 million.
According to the state register, the main beneficiary of VITAGRO is MP Serhiy Labaziuk, and the CEO is Petro Labaziuk.
