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Stark dump, which takes Akron's trash, extracts methane gas and sells it to utilities. Process helps reduce the greenhouse effect
By Bob Downing
Beacon Journal staff writer
Published on Sunday, Sep 20, 2009
SANDY TWP.: Slowly brewing below the surface of once rolling land in southeastern Stark County is one of Ohio's newest sources of energy.
About 400 acres of the sprawling American Landfill are perforated with 133 wells that are extracting volatile methane gas that is created by the decomposition of buried household garbage.
As much as 4 million cubic feet of gas — enough to heat 6,155 households a day — is cooled and filtered, then pushed west through a nine-mile high-pressure pipeline from outside of Waynesburg west to a Dominion East Ohio facility near East Sparta.
Dominion blends the landfill extract with natural gas — which is 99 percent methane — in its large pipeline that runs from the Ohio River to Stark County's Jackson Township before it is sold by Texas-based Toro Energy to heat homes and factories.
American Landfill, where all of Akron's garbage goes, is one of the state's largest landfills and is part of a growing number of such operations that are capturing the landfill gases.
The reasons are primarily twofold: Methane is a source of energy, and it is a big contributor to global warming. Keeping it from
escaping is a good thing.
While carbon dioxide is often identified as the No. 1 cause of the greenhouse effect, methane is more than 23 times more powerful at trapping heat in the upper atmosphere. Overall, far less methane is generated than carbon dioxide. It is a shorter-lived problem than carbon dioxide.
Cows are the No. 1 source of methane in the United States, accounting for 23.7 percent of emissions. Landfills are the second, with 22.7 percent, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
Because of methane's explosive threat, the federal government had required that methane emissions from larger landfills be flared or burned.
But that's changed, and what's happening to extract landfill gas that is 50 to 55 percent methane at sites like American Landfill is part of a sweeping trend in the last five years.
The EPA said it is aware of 485 landfill gas projects in 44 states that together are collecting 85 billion cubic feet of gas and generating 12 billion kilowatt hours of electricity — roughly the same as an average U.S. nuclear power plant.
About 40 percent of the country's 1,000 largest landfills, including 11 in Ohio, are collecting and marketing their landfill gases. The number is expected to grow.
One of the largest landfill-gas-to-pipeline facilities in the world is in Southwest Ohio: the Rumpke Sanitary Landfill near Cincinnati. That facility is recovering 15 million cubic feet of landfill gas a day from three gas-recovery plants operated by Montauk Energy Capital. That's enough gas to heat 25,000 households. (By comparison, Cuyahoga Falls has about 21,000 households.)
In the Columbus area, gases from the 142-acre Franklin County's Landfill are being turned into compressed natural gas to fuel CNG-powered cars and light trucks. The landfill gas from the Grove City site is expected to save 250,000 gallons of gasoline a year, said the Waste Management Authority of Central Ohio.
Unrecycled gases
Until March 2008, gas from Akron's closed Hardy Road landfill was used to heat the city's nearby sewage and composting plants along the Cuyahoga River, said spokesman Brian Gresser.
The city does not own the rights to the landfill gases. They were sold off to private companies. They now belong to Mel Kurtz, whose company manages the city's composting plant. Using those gases is not economically viable and the gas is being burned off, spokesmen said.
The other large landfill in the area — Countywide Recycling & Disposal Facility in Stark County's Pike Township — is not extracting its methane gas, said spokesman Jeff Kraus.
The levels of methane are too low to be valuable because of the chemical reaction taking place within the landfill, he said.
Countywide, owned by Florida-based Republic Services, has been fighting to control underground fires and odors since late 2005. The problems were triggered by reactive aluminum wastes coming in contact with landfill liquids.
If the landfill gases were collected at Countywide, there would be contamination and quality problems, said Kurt Princic of the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency.
Instead the gases from new landfill cells and the older areas are mixed and burned off under federal-state orders, he said.
Popular process
Waste Management, which owns American Landfill, recycles gases at five of its Ohio landfills, said Todd Brady, gas operations manager for the company.
Gases from a Solon landfill in Cuyahoga County are used to heat food producer Nestle USA. At Toledo, the gases go to a Sunoco refinery. In Cincinnati, they are used by Procter & Gamble. In Dayton, the gases from a closed landfill are mixed with natural gas.
The Houston-based company has 273 active landfills in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico, with about 100 equipped to recycle gases and the number is growing, Brady said.
American Landfill's gas-extraction system was started in 2003 and produces between 3 million and 4 million cubic feet a day of landfill gas.
Brady declined to say how much that gas is worth.
The landfill has more than 15 million tons of trash already buried and gets a fresh 3,700 tons a day into the 1,072-acre site. The landfill has the capacity to accept trash for another 62 years.
The EPA estimates that 1 million tons of trash can produce 432,000 cubic feet of landfill gas a day.
Brady said trash has to be buried at least 18 months before it starts to produce methane.
The methane concentration varies, depending on the level of organic material in the buried trash, he said.
The more household trash in the buried waste, the more methane will be produced, he said.
Fine-tuning system
Matt Abahazi is the landfill gas technician whose job requires him to constantly fine-tune the gas-extraction system, which acts as a giant vacuum, sucking the landfill gases from deep within the buried wastes.
Wells can be drilled after the trash has been deposited or piping can be installed vertically and horizontally as the landfill is expanded.
In general, it takes at least one well per acre. Cells can produce quality methane for up to 30 years, although the volume will decrease over time, Abahazi said.
He takes readings at least twice a month at each well and checks the flare — needed for emergencies and at times when the gas cannot be marketed — and equipment at the landfill gas plant daily. The data are downloaded into a computer and monitored for optimum efficiency. Chemical contaminants and moisture must be removed.
Abahazi said that as a result of the systems at American, there are no emissions into the atmosphere.
The landfill gas cannot be blended 1:1 with natural gas because the methane concentration is not high enough and there is a significant amount of carbon dioxide, which hinders burning.
Landfill gas is blended at a rate of one part to 10 parts of natural gas to make it useful, Abahazi said.
The gas is constantly tested after blending at the site and 10 miles away to make sure that it meets natural gas specifications and is not too diluted, said Neil Durbin of Dominion East Ohio.
Technically, Dominion East Ohio does not own the blended gas. It only stores and ships it on behalf of gas marketers, including Texas-based Toro Energy, he said.
Bob Downing can be reached at 330-996-3745 or bdowning@thebeaconjournal.com.
SANDY TWP.: Slowly brewing below the surface of once rolling land in southeastern Stark County is one of Ohio's newest sources of energy.
Get the full article here.
Comments
Click here to post your comments
Canton, OH
Posted 12:36 PM, 09/20/2009
wow. . .
Akron, Oh
Posted 12:24 AM, 09/21/2009
If only we could harness the power of the cow.
STFU, FO
Posted 07:39 AM, 09/26/2009
wow
Posted 07:44 AM, 09/26/2009
γ
nancy, ky
Posted 08:02 AM, 09/30/2009
If new solid waste is being disposed at Countywide, away from the area on fire, why can't those new cells be tapped for methane capture? Why are cells from the area that are separated from the cells on fire generating low levels or contaminated methane?
It makes one wonder...
Also, capturing methane from a landfill with a cap on it is not the simple, problem-free energy production it is touted to be. Gases will be gases and will migrate or follow the easiest route available. This may mean that some of the methane can find an alternate path, surfacing in an unexpected location. Before methane collection can safely take place, extensive research into the geological profile of the area must be performed. This includes historical airborne photography and other data. It is essential that all of the gas is forced to flow in the direction desired. There are many examples of methane gas migrating into unexpected locations and surfacing. A spark or a lit cigarette can then detonate a violent explosion.
Make sure all your background work is done before you celebrate the wonders of methane gas collection, storage, and use.
CH
nancy, ky
Posted 08:06 AM, 09/30/2009
If only we could safely harness the power of the hot gas being released from certain (unnamed) human being's mouths, our energy problems would be nearly solved...
