Each week, dumpsters line the curbs of neighborhoods across the Golden Triangle. Garbage trucks comb through towns and rural areas, collecting our throwaways to take to the dump.
More than 450 tons of solid waste is buried each day at the Golden Triangle Regional Solid Waste Management Authority Regional Landfill on the Oktibbeha-Clay county line.
The methane gas produced from decomposed waste is typically flared and released into the atmosphere — ironically, wasted — until now.
Tuesday, representatives from the Waste Management Authority, 4-County Electric Power Association, the Tennessee Valley Authority and local governments officially launched the state’s first landfill gas-to-electricity reactor, which will convert the methane gas into electricity to power an estimated 600 Golden Triangle homes.
TVA will buy the power generated from the Golden Triangle facility through the 4-County distribution system.
“This is a project that benefits not only 4-County members and customers of the landfill, but also people of the Tennessee Valley, TVA and most importantly, our local environment,” 4-County CEO Joe Cade said. “The methane at the landfill is currently burned off. By helping the (Waste Management Authority) turn this gas into electricity, we are helping provide renewable power to TVA and all local electric utility consumers.”
The Golden Triangle landfill, like all landfills in the state that have more than one section completely filled and capped, had to install a gas collection and control system to safely release the explosive gas. It completed the system and had it operational by Dec. 17, 2009.
Waste Management Authority officials met with representatives from GE — manufacturer of the landfill gas-to-energy engine — in March 2010 to discuss the process.
TVA accepted the plan through its Generation Partners renewable energy incentives program on October 2010. Under the incentive program, residents and commercial businesses can offset their energy costs if they generate their own electricity that TVA can capture and use.
The agreement will help reduce landfill operating costs and fees, as well as keep TVA customer rates stable.
“As more of these projects go online, there’s more energy produced locally,” said David Sparks, Mississippi delivery manager for TVA. “TVA doesn’t have to spend money as quickly on new generations — this is a local source. It’s actually cheaper for us to pay these incentives than it is to build new generations. If we can take incentives and put those into local economy, that’s smarter than going out and building a new power plant and spending twice the money.”
Sparks said TVA is committed to saving 3.5 percent of its total energy — the equivalent of several nuclear reactors — through Generations Partners projects.
The Waste Management Authority’s executive director of daily operations, Jimmy Sloan, said that without the Generation Partners incentive, the project wouldn’t have been possible.
“Without that program, these projects are expensive,” Sloan said. “If you can’t get a return on your investment in a decent amount of time, it wouldn’t be financially worth it.”
The environmental impact of the landfill gas convertor, which includes a 20-cylinder GE engine, is significant: The methane processed daily at the site is the equivalent to the emissions of 8,500 passenger vehicles. Collectively, landfills are the nation’s third-largest, human-generated source of methane emissions. Natural gas systems and animal digestive systems are the first and second-largest sources, respectively.
“It’s beneficial, not just for green energy, but also for our own resources,” said Roger George, North American regional sales leader for GE Energy. “We’re offsetting the use of natural gas.”
Sloan said the current generator limits the amount of energy it can sell to TVA to 999 kilowatts an hour. As the landfill grows, more wells and piping used to capture and transport the gas will be installed. Sloan declined to place a dollar figure on the Waste Management Authority’s profit from selling the electricity but said he should know within three months.
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