AmerenUE’s new plan: Garbage in, renewable energy out
This is no way to collect biogas.
About 2 million tons of trash is generated in the St. Louis region each year. Half winds up in landfills. Those landfills could be our own miniature Saudi Arabias.
Buried deep within those landfills are piles of rotting garbage. When it rots, it can produce a mostly untapped source of renewable energy: methane.
Beginning in 2011, utility giant AmerenUE will start using methane collected at one St. Louis County landfill to generate electricity. That’s a good thing for the environment. It’s also a good thing for Missouri, which relies heavily on coal-fired power plants for its electricity.
Burning coal releases carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. They cause global warming. A bill aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions, now pending in Congress, would make it more expensive to operate coal-fired power plants.
Most people don’t realize it, but rotting garbage also generates a greenhouse gas. Methane is 21 times more efficient at trapping heat than carbon dioxide. To keep it out of the atmosphere, methane vented from landfills usually is burned off.
Last year, voters approved an initiative that requires investor-owned Missouri utilities to get 15 percent of their electric generation from renewable sources by 2021.
Most of us think renewable energy means solar power or wind power, and they certainly are part of the equation. In June, AmerenUE announced a deal to buy 102 megawatts of power from an Iowa wind farm, enough to power about 26,000 homes. But landfill gas also is a renewable energy source.
AmerenUE’s new facility is expected to cost between $35 million and $45 million. It will be built at the Fred Weber Co. landfill in Maryland Heights.
Some gas generated from that landfill already is collected to provide power at an asphalt plant and for heat at Pattonville High School and a nearby greenhouse. But the AmerenUE plant will be far bigger — generating 15 megawatts of electricity, enough to power about 10,000 homes.
The facility will the first new base-load power plant built by AmerenUE in years. Unlike so-called peaking plants, which go into operation only when electricity demand gets higher, base-load plants operate all day every day. It also is expected to be among the nation’s largest landfill gas-fired power plants.
In the long run, hydroelectric, wind and solar power probably will play a much larger role in the renewable energy mix than trash-to-methane, in part because burning landfill gas still releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. But landfill gas burns cleaner than coal, and burning methane keeps it out of the atmosphere.
Abundant supplies of coal help ensure it will be used by power plants for decades to come. But the St. Louis region is situated close to another potential huge source of methane: biogas.
That is methane collected from human and animal waste. And like methane from landfill waste or methane in natural gas, it can be burned to produce power.
AmerenUE’s new landfill gas plant is a win for the utility, a win for landfill operator Fred Weber and a win for the environment. It can be a template for other small-scale renewable power plants, which is an even bigger win for the environment.
That makes all of us no-nonsense Midwesterners happy. We hate to think of all that waste just going to waste.
Looking for new energy sources is good. Claiming it will save the environment is a bit over the top. This new plant will not save the environment. It will not cool down the temperature in St. Louis. It may not even be profitable for the company.
I admire the certainty of your words, but this action will do little for our planet.
Certainly, this is a good thing, but don’t get too excited. Saving the planet sounds good, but really what we are acheiving is energy indepedence and diversity.
This would have been a more meaningful editorial if a few basic facts were provided:
1. The capital investment of about $4,000 per served household means a cost of $36 per month per household, amortized over 15 years at 7%. How does this compare to the cost of other generation methods?
2. How will the operating costs of this plant compare to other generation methods? Even if the methane is free (is it?), fuel is only one of many costs in operating such a facility.
Also, you say that “hydroelectric, wind and solar power probably will play a much larger role in the renewable energy mix than trash-to-methane, in part because burning landfill gas still releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.” But you also say that burning the gas has a net positive impact on global warming because the methane “is 21 times more efficient at trapping heat than carbon dioxide.” These two statements contradict one another.
Consistency, and a little research, would have greatly improved this editorial.
Will St. Louis County be making money off the methane source? If so, how will this affect trash services and costs to county residents?
Just wait until Obama puts mandates on how far you can drive your car in a day, what kind of car you can drive, what temperature you must set the thermostat at in your home, etc. As the saying goes, “you ain’t seen nothin’ yet.” I honestly think his views on the environment are more radical & screwed up than Al Gore’s.
I saw another show on tv about no sunspots for the past few years. It seems we may NEED a little global warming if this goes on for too much longer. My summer cooling bills dropped about $50 a month LAST YEAR and they were a little cheaper this summer. I don’t get it. Quit listening to Odumbo and Al Gore and all those Lear Jet liberals who are worshiping at the global warming altar, for awhile. Start listening to those 20,000 scientists who signed that statement about global warming being a farce and that because of the lower level of sunspots the last 11 years might possibly bring us to a mini Ice Age. I think this is the same group that said the MOST PREVALENT green house gas in the atmosphere was WATER VAPOR.
Ameren is the mafia.