The first is either scale, or the ability to develop to scale and operate successfully at scale. How has Viridis seen the development landscape change in the past 12 to 18 months, and how do you play to those changes and looking ahead? Benham: I have been in the RNG space a long time-I like to say before there was an ‘R’ in RNG, and I would say there are at least two things that any developer needs to have in terms of being successful today. BMM: There’s so much momentum in this space. And of course, having the backing of a word class private equity firm like Warburg Pincus really lets us accelerate, and helps us attract the very best team in the industry. We’ve got four active projects in construction across three different feedstocks, and we’ve got a pipeline of opportunities … we’re really happy with where we are, and we’re finding a lot of great reception in the industry. By any measure, looking at it objectively, we’re off to a great start. When we looked at the available opportunities, it was either acquisition, or try to stand up an RNG platform company-we chose the latter … Our thesis was, if we could recruit the best people from the industry and then, turn loose-in a structured way-with a $300 million equity commitment from Warburg, we could find and deliver projects on a really accelerated timeline. Our equity sponsor, Warburg Pincus, really wanted find a way to get into the RNG space in a bit of a different way, but also rapidly. Benham: It’s an interesting story-one of entrepreneurship, deep technical expertise and a world class balance sheet coming together at the beginning of the company’s evolution, rather than further along. BMM: Tell us about Viridis Energy and its origin, and what the company is all about. During the podcast, Benham discussed keys to project success, the landscape of the RNG sector and how it has changed over the years.
He also held the title of CEO of Air Liquide Advanced Technologies, U.S. Before Viridi, he spent more than 10 years working for Air Liquide, spearheading gas processing, biogas and midstream development projects. Benham has held leadership positions in the gas separation and biogas processing business for the past 15 years. Viridi Energy’s Chet Benham was the guest on Season 2, Episode 5, of the Biomass Magazine podcast.
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