Prepared for lenders, CDCs, and federal agencies to SBA SOP 50 10 8, USDA 7 CFR Part 5001, and conventional underwriting standards. Fiduciary duty runs to the lender and the agency, never the borrower. 4,000+ engagements since 1998 covering $41.2 billion in evaluated project value. So far in 2026: 41 engagements and $1.54 billion evaluated — 17 SBA, 11 USDA.
RNG feasibility joins feedstock certainty to environmental-credit markets: the manure, food-waste, landfill, or wastewater feedstock under contract or ownership, biogas yield and upgrading economics, pipeline interconnection, and the RIN, LCFS, or voluntary-market revenue modeled with honest price risk. Dairy-digester projects are evaluated with herd-size, manure-management, and farm-economics analysis the agricultural programs expect.
Methodology uses feedstock characterization and yield benchmarks, credit-market price series with conservative cases, interconnection and offtake review, and capital benchmarks by digester class. Coverage is tested with credit prices stressed well below current markets.
Every Wert-Berater financial model is fully linked with no hardcoded values, so any reviewer can stress any input. Deliverables comprise a complete narrative report and the linked Excel model, with ten-year pro forma, sensitivity analysis at ±5, 10, and 15 percent, interest-rate stress from +0.5 to +3.0 percent, and ratio analysis benchmarked against RMA and IBISWorld data.
SBA engagements are prepared to SOP 50 10 8, including its debt-service-coverage minimums of 1.15x operating and 1.00x global. USDA engagements follow RD Staff Instruction 5001 across the Business & Industry, Community Facilities, REAP, and Value-Added Producer Grant programs. Conventional engagements are built to the lender's stated coverage standard, typically 1.20x. Clean-energy engagements are prepared to USDA 7 CFR Part 5001 where REAP and B&I apply — including the energy-production documentation, incentive analysis, and payback arithmetic REAP requires — and to conventional and institutional standards otherwise, with interconnection and incentive risk addressed directly rather than assumed away.
Representative clean-energy work includes a $52,688,000 green carbon project evaluation and renewable-energy feasibility within the firm's USDA REAP and B&I practice. Independence is non-negotiable: determinations follow the evidence and are not revised under pressure, and studies are built to pass lender, agency, and third-party review without exception items.
A feasibility study for an RNG or anaerobic digester project must do more than confirm that biogas can be produced. It must trace every dollar from feedstock gate to revenue recognition and demonstrate that the capital structure survives credit-price volatility, feedstock interruption, and interconnection delay simultaneously. Wert-Berater builds each engagement around the specific digester class — covered lagoon, complete-mix, plug-flow, or dry fermentation — because capital intensity, retention time, and biogas quality differ materially across configurations and those differences flow directly into the coverage ratio.
Demand analysis for an RNG project is not a population-driven market-size exercise. It is a supply-security and price-discovery exercise: the study must establish that a buyer exists, at what price, under what contract terms, and with what credit quality. Wert-Berater assembles that picture from sources that are specific to this asset class rather than generic economic databases.
On the offtake side, the analysis draws on utility interconnection-queue filings, published gas-quality tariff schedules, and executed or draft offtake agreements. Where a project intends to sell compressed or liquefied RNG directly to fleet operators, the study reviews fleet-size documentation and fuel-purchase records rather than relying on stated intent alone.
On the credit-market side, EPA EMTS transaction data, CARB LCFS credit-transfer records, and broker price series are used to construct a price history and a defensible forward assumption. Because RIN and LCFS prices are administratively sensitive — subject to waiver petitions, standard adjustments, and regulatory revision — the study documents the policy basis for each credit pathway and stress-tests revenue at prices well below current markets.
Competitive-supply analysis examines permitted and operating digesters within the relevant interconnection zone using state environmental-permit registries and EPA AgSTAR project data, assessing whether feedstock aggregation assumptions are realistic given existing projects drawing from the same geographic catchment.
Four inputs account for the majority of coverage-ratio movement in a digester or RNG project, and each requires a specific testing protocol rather than a single-point estimate. Wert-Berater identifies these inputs at the outset of every engagement and builds the linked model so a reviewer can move any one of them independently.
SBA, USDA, and conventional lenders each bring a distinct set of concerns to an RNG or digester credit, and a study that satisfies one standard without addressing the others creates review friction that slows closings.
Under SBA SOP 50 10 8, the primary concern is global cash-flow coverage at 1.00x and operating coverage at 1.15x. For RNG projects, SBA reviewers focus on whether environmental-credit revenue is treated as recurring or non-recurring income, and the study addresses that classification directly with reference to the regulatory basis for each credit pathway.
USDA REAP engagements require energy-production documentation, a simple payback calculation, and an incentive analysis alongside the standard feasibility determination. USDA Business & Industry and Value-Added Producer Grant reviews emphasize community economic impact and, for dairy-digester projects, the integration of farm-level economics with project-level debt service. Wert-Berater prepares the farm-economics analysis the agricultural programs expect, including herd-size verification and manure-management cost offsets.
Conventional lenders typically require 1.20x coverage and place particular weight on offtake-contract term relative to loan maturity, the creditworthiness of the gas purchaser or RIN broker, and the engineering basis for yield assumptions. The study addresses each of these directly, and the fully linked model allows a credit officer to re-run coverage under any combination of assumptions without requesting a revised report.
Every Wert-Berater engagement begins with a fixed fee quoted within one business day of inquiry. The fee does not change if the analysis is more complex than anticipated, and no portion of it is contingent on the conclusion. A sponsor or lender who needs a preliminary indication of feasibility before committing to a full study receives the same quoted fee for the full deliverable; there is no tiered or preliminary product that defers the hard questions.
The data room drives the clock. Standard delivery is ten to fifteen business days from receipt of a complete data room. For RNG and digester projects, a complete data room includes feedstock documentation (manure-management records, waste-supply agreements, or landfill-gas flow data), engineering basis for the selected digester configuration, interconnection pre-application or executed agreement, draft or executed offtake or RIN-marketing agreement, and the project capital budget with contractor or vendor support. Rush delivery is available when the lender's commitment timeline requires it.
Once the study is complete, the bound narrative report and the fully linked Excel model are published to a secure client portal. The model remains live: a credit officer or agency reviewer can change any input — feedstock volume, credit price, interest rate, draw schedule — and every output recalculates instantly. No hardcoded values means no hidden assumptions. The portal eliminates the back-and-forth of requesting revised sensitivity runs and gives the reviewing institution direct, auditable access to the analytical foundation of the determination.
Wert-Berater quotes a fixed fee within one business day of inquiry. The fee is project-specific and does not change based on the conclusion or the complexity encountered during analysis. No portion of the fee is contingent on a positive finding. Contact the firm with a project summary and the intended financing program to receive a quote.
Standard delivery is ten to fifteen business days from receipt of a complete data room. For RNG and digester projects, the data room must include feedstock documentation, an engineering basis for the digester configuration, interconnection correspondence, and offtake or RIN-marketing agreement drafts. Rush delivery is available when a lender commitment deadline requires it.
Three factors create underwriting difficulty that generic feasibility templates miss: environmental-credit prices are administratively set and can move sharply on regulatory action; feedstock volume is often tied to a single agricultural operation or waste-supply contract with limited redundancy; and interconnection timelines are outside the borrower's control. A credible study stress-tests all three independently and shows coverage at trough conditions, not only at current market prices.
Not automatically. USDA REAP requires energy-production documentation, a simple payback calculation, and an incentive analysis that SBA does not require. Wert-Berater prepares each engagement to the specific program standard. A study intended for both SBA and REAP review is scoped to meet both sets of requirements from the outset rather than amended after the fact.
Environmental-credit revenue is modeled at a conservative base case drawn from EPA EMTS and CARB transaction records, with a stress case reflecting historical trough pricing. The study documents the regulatory basis for each credit pathway and the gap between the stress-case revenue and the debt-service-coverage minimum, so a reviewer can see exactly how much credit-price deterioration the project can absorb.
Yes. Wert-Berater builds the engagement to the most demanding standard among the financing programs involved. Where USDA B&I and a conventional senior lender are both reviewing the same project, the study addresses USDA 7 CFR Part 5001 requirements and the conventional lender's coverage standard — typically 1.20x — within a single deliverable, avoiding duplicative work and conflicting assumptions.
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Wert-Berater, Inc. is an independent provider of feasibility studies and other related services. The firm does not provide financing or equity investment advice, and does not arrange, broker, or place debt or equity capital of any kind.
All appraisal assignments are performed by Bruce E. Jones, MAI, ASA-GC, BCA, CMEA, a member of the Appraisal Institute since 2006, a staff member of Wert-Berater, Inc. and owner of Special Purpose Realty Valuation.