Relevance. Structural changes in the Russian market create new trends, including energy supply in remote areas. The government is planning to redirect natural gas to domestic buyers. However, according to the estimates of biogas potential, it can fully meet the energy needs of households with no access to centralized gas supply. Research objective is to choose the optimal scenario of gasification in remote areas by evaluating the economic feasibility of several alternatives, including biogas technologies and the centralized gas supply system. Data and methods. The study focuses on the case of Sverdlovsk region and considers three scenarios of gasification in its remote areas. The method includes the calculation of the full discounted value of energy facilities, the comparison of their productive capacity, the analysis of the key external factors. Results. In terms of cost, the most economically feasible is the scenario of biogas plants using by individual households. However, accounting productivity, the scenarios based on the use of centralized gas supply or collective biogas plants. The economic feasibility of these two scenarios depends on the number of buildings serviced. Conclusions. The optimal scenario is the centralized gas supply. Despite its high costs, it can ensure the uninterrupted supply of the necessary energy amount to private households and does not depend on factors such as the availability of manure and organic waste and weather conditions. One more advantage is that Russia currently has a more elaborate and adequate legal framework regulating its use than for the other two options.

The main trend in energy development is to increase energy efficiency by reducing the use of limited natural resources, the spread of renewable energy, and reducing the negative impact on the environment. An effective response to these challenges is the use of biogas plants that produce clean energy and solve the environmental problems of waste disposal and recycling. The purpose of the article is to assess the economic efficiency of replacing district gas supply with autonomous biogas plants in public utilities. A hypothesis has been put forward that the feasibility of using such technologies depends on climatic features and the specific provisions of state regulation of prices and gas consumption rates. A cost approach was applied that assesses the overall structure of equipment costs, as well as a comparative assessment method according to the principle “with / without a biogas plant”, and a scenario analysis, the criterion of which is the size of the family owning the plant. An auxiliary method for forecasting retail and economically justified prices for natural gas for the population was used. The object of calculations is the “HomeBiogas” installation intended for home use. Three Russian cities were chosen as territorial subjects: Yekaterinburg, Irkutsk and Krasnodar. The cities which differ significantly in their natural characteristics and approaches to the formation of retail gas prices. It has been proved that although the average monthly temperatures differ significantly in the cities considered, none of them has a constant temperature exceeding the required standard value of 17°C. In each case, the initial capital investment is driven up by the cost of installing additional insulation and heating systems. This equalizes the costs of warmer and colder areas. Therefore, the climatic features of cities are not significant and do not affect the economic efficiency of using a biogas plant. In turn, state regulation of prices and norms of gas consumption by the population is of decisive importance. The findings are of theoretical and practical importance. The methodology can be applied to assess the efficiency of using biogas plants in industry and gasification projects in the remote areas of Russia.