Louisville landfill to create natural gas from emissions

Houston-based Waste Management’s Outer Loop Landfill in Louisville, Kentucky, is planning to capture and sell its methane for natural gas after a three-year hiatus, a report by the Courier-Journal says.

Waste Management is seeking a new air permit from the Louisville Metro Air Pollution Control District for the new facility and a change in its land-use plant that will allow it to clean the methane for use in its fleet and in a natural gas pipeline that runs through the 600-acre area, the report says.

The company previously sent methane to General Electric’s Appliance Park in Louisville and flaring off the remainder, the report says. For the last three years, the landfill has only been flaring the methane.

If permitted, the facility will hold technology that will make enough natural gas to power ten times as many trucks as the landfill previously fueled—80 trucks—or enough for typical use in 12,000 homes, the report says.
 
The new process will allow Waste Management and the Outer Loop Landfill to adhere to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regulations issued in July 2016 that requires capture and control of landfill gas emissions at levels that are one-third lower than current requirements, the report says.