Territorial governance for the anticipation and resolution of conflicts in projects of valorization of digestates

The bioeconomy and the circular economy have recently gained a major place in the European Union policies on the ecological, energy and social transition. Supported by these public policies, the biogas sector has experienced a remarkable growth in recent years. Biogas production makes it possible to produce both gas from renewable resources, and digestate, a by-product which amending and fertilizing properties are useful for agriculture. The “return to the soil” of digestate is considered as a key element of the circularity of the biogas sector. However, numerous controversies remain over the environmental and health impacts of returning digestates to the soil, and conflicts related to the actual or supposed negative externalities of digestates negatively impact the development of the sector. We use a qualitative method, centred on the analysis of case studies, to explore this topic, about which the scientific literature remains very scarce. We try to understand, at first, the nature of these conflicts, and secondly, how territorial governance mechanisms can anticipate or solve these conflicts. Our results show that conflicts emerge around certain dimensions of the territorial capital: the preservation of the natural capital, the inadequacy of the infrastructural and equipment capital, and oppositions around the cultural capital. These conflicts often crystallize previous tense situations, at a local or regional scale. The activation of territorial proximity, at different spatial scales, local, regional and sub-regional, with the intervention, sometimes, of one or more public or private intermediaries, allows stakeholders to coordinate in order to: exchange information and better mobilize the territorial capital, produce and acquire new knowledge in the event of uncertainty about the impacts of digestates, and develop common political visions on the development of the sector.