Power to the Poop: One Colorado City Is Using Human Waste to Run Its Vehicles

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January 22, 2016

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Melanie Sevcenko (The Guardian) Renewable natural gas is a growing industry for fuel, electricity and heat, but advocates says it’s a largely untapped market in the US — No matter how you spin it, the business of raw sewage isn’t sexy. But in Colorado, the city of Grand Junction is making huge strides to reinvent their wastewater industry – and the result is like finding a diamond in the sludge.

The Persigo Wastewater Treatment Plant is processing 8m gallons of Grand Junction’s human waste into renewable natural gas (RNG), also known as biomethane. The RNG is then used to fuel about 40 fleet vehicles, including garbage trucks, street sweepers, dump trucks and transit buses.

It’s possible through a process called anaerobic digestion, which breaks down organic matter into something called raw biogas. The biogas is then collected and upgraded to RNG – at pipeline quality – and can be used as electricity, heat or transportation fuel.

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Tonello (Dan Tonello, wastewater services manager for Grand Junction) said their old method involved simply flaring off the raw gas into the atmosphere.

“Now, instead of letting it go to the flare, it goes to conditioning equipment that scrubs and cleans the gas and puts it into a pipeline,” Tonello said.

The environmental benefits are abundant for Grand Junction. According to Bret Guillory, utility engineer for the city, “we may be reducing greenhouse gases by as much as 60% to 80% … This is compared to the old process of flaring off the raw gas at the plant, and burning diesel and gasoline in some of our larger fleet equipment.” READ MORE / MORE and MORE (BBC)

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