Three multi-million dollar waste-fed biomass digesters are in the works in Tulare County that will turn trash to cash, mostly into energy related products.
Largest and nearest at hand is Colony Energy’s $20 million,4 million gallon anaerobic digester/cogeneration complex on ten acres of City-owned land located at 2450 W. Paige Ave.The firm will lease the land from the city next to the wastewater treatment plant. VP for project development Matt Schmitt says the project has now received all environmental approvals and will break ground in the first quarter of next year. ” WM Lyles will build our project that should be operation in mid-2014.”
Schmitt says the plan is to accept about 25 loads a day of mostly food waste,about 20% cow manure and the rest ag waste to produce approximately 700,000 cubic feet per day of biogas,essentially CNG.”We will connect to the SoCal pipeline and the gas will go out to customers.” Some will be converted to LNG he says.
The project also features a combined heat and power plant to create electricity and heat in the form of steam or hot water.The steam/hot water has the potential for being used by the City at its wastewater treatment plant to heat the existing digesters and thereby improve efficiency.
Colony Energy is counting on increased demand for renewable biogas in California and has plans to duplicate the project at several other locations in the state says Schmitt. The Tulare project should generate over 30 jobs.
Anaerobic digestion uses naturally occurring microorganisms to break down organic materials and produce biogas, a mixture of methane and carbon dioxide. The biogas can be combusted to produce renewable electricity, cleaned to pipeline natural gas standards, or further processed into compressed natural gas (CNG) fuel. Through anaerobic digestion, many goals can be accomplished:
Divert organic materials from landfills and incinerators
Generate clean, distributed, renewable energy
Restore and maintain healthy soils using compost products
Displace chemical fertilizers
Create green jobs
Also near Tulare,Harvest Power, who owns Tulare County Compost on Lovers Lane has plans for building a new anerobic digester that will turn organic waste into fertilizer and energy. Harvest Power,based in Washington, recently secured $110 million from venture capital investors including Kleiner Perkins to build facilities at multiple locations The unit will break down food scraps and yard clippings in a closed vessel, producing both fertilizer and biogas that can be used to produce electricity or be processed into compressed natural gas for transportation fuel. Harvest Power is working on a full EIR with the county confirm county officials.The company refused comment.
Another closed vessel digester is going to be built at Calgren Renewable Fuels plant in Pixley taking piped-in cow manure and converting it to biogas to power its ethanol making operation.The $10 million project on Highway 99 faces hurdles in the form of opposition from neighbors that has stalled their mitigated negative declaration- based application to the county.The Pixley Biogas project received a $4.7 million grant from the California Energy Commission but despite a redesign to meet concerns of California Dairies with a plant nearby,the project has been stalled until now.
This week president of Calgren,Lyle Schlyer said the company will now go through a formal EIR to get the project built.The EIR is expected to take about 6 months.