So I bought a power plant

[red-beard]

A few of you know I've been traveling to Boise a bit over the past year. We purchased a landfill gas to energy project.

This is a small plant, 3.2 Mega-Watts, but with expansion potential. It consists of two Caterpillar 3520 Engine Generator sets, setup for low BTU gas. Landfill gas is 40-60% Methane, 30% CO2 and the rest Nitrogen, water vapor and general crud. You have to do a little "clean up" on the gas before it is used by the engines.

Most landfills are now required to collect the methane generated. Most simply flare the gas. The gas is "cheap", about 1/3rd the price of natural Gas on a BTU basis. And we're taking a wasted resource and turning into something useful. I always point out that in the early petroleum industry days, the focus was making kerosene. Gasolines were too volatile, and were flared or dumped into rivers.

Because it is bio-gas, it is considered renewable. But unlike solar and wind, we produce power 24-7.

So in the immortal words of "He-Man"

I have the power!

[GH85Carrera]

So the next GE has been started!

Congrats, on become a power mogul.

[rockfan4]

Awesome!
The company I work for is doing the same thing on a smaller scale, one engine producing 1100kw. The heat the engine gives off also heats our hot water and heats two buildings in the winter.

[McLovin]

[kach22i]

That's awesome.

There is a landfill outside of Ann Arbor, direction of the winds have so everything downwind is undeveloped, upwind has mega-million dollar homes.

I don't know if they collect the methane, seems like if they did you could not smell the place so much when driving by.

[vash]

oh..have i got some methane for you!!

[wildthing]

That's nothing compared to 1.21 Gigawatts! (jiga)

Where's Doc Brown when you need him? Hahaha

[vash]

hey, what do you think of Boise?

[RedBaron]

It looks like Idaho doesn't have an ISO or an RTO so I assume the electric company is still a vertically integrated monopoly? How do you settle on getting paid for your real time energy production - is it a fixed PPA between you and the respective utility? Kind of curious about what you get paid for $/MWhr.

[Laneco]

Originally Posted by kach22i

That's awesome.

There is a landfill outside of Ann Arbor, direction of the winds have so everything downwind is undeveloped, upwind has mega-million dollar homes.

I don't know if they collect the methane, seems like if they did you could not smell the place so much when driving by.

Methane is odorless. The smell is other things...

angela

[ckelly78z]

Originally Posted by kach22i

That's awesome.

There is a landfill outside of Ann Arbor, direction of the winds have so everything downwind is undeveloped, upwind has mega-million dollar homes.

I don't know if they collect the methane, seems like if they did you could not smell the place so much when driving by.

We have two big hills of trash about 2 miles North of us, luckily we don't get a North wind very often, but when we do, it smells like a bad septic tank. It makes me mad that I see trainloads of garbage from out of state being dumped, and buried locally.

[Evans, Marv]

Generating my own power has always been something I've wanted to do. I've worked a couple of places that did it & was always intrigued. The closest I've gotten was my yearly solar true up statement from the utility yesterday of a balance of $106 in my favor. They paid me two to four cents per Kwhr. (their wholesale rate) for almost a megawatt of extra my system generated over the past year (Cali net metering program). Their top tier charge (of 3 tiers) to customers is about 47 cents/Kwhr.

[mikehinton]

Marv, were you a net producer of power with your system, or was the favorable balance just a function of playing the "time of use" game properly? In the old days (12 years ago), PG&E in Nor Cal would only pay you if your energy production exceeded your usage.

[cmccuist]

Hi Red Beard!

What made you decide on the Caterpillars? I'm doing a project right now for the University of West Indies in Kingston. We are using the GE Jenbacher line and burning natural gas, but they make biogas units as well.

I'm actually in Budapest this week for the testing. GE has a huge facility here. Really impressive place. These Hungarians can build some generating units!

[Evans, Marv]

Mike. Maybe I wasn't too clear when I said, "for almost a megawatt of extra my system generated over the past year." Yes, I was a net producer & was pointing to the fact they paid net producers two to four cents per kilowatt hour while charging up to 47/49 cents for their top tier of usage. I inquired about just rolling over my extra production, but they said no dice. I'm on the original net metering program.

[mikehinton]

Thanks,Marv. Our system was designed to produce about 75% of our consumption, so no checks from PG&E yet.

[LWJ]

Cool. I insure a couple of those. Did Gerry F. do the engineering?

[red-beard]

Originally Posted by RedBaron

It looks like Idaho doesn't have an ISO or an RTO so I assume the electric company is still a vertically integrated monopoly? How do you settle on getting paid for your real time energy production - is it a fixed PPA between you and the respective utility? Kind of curious about what you get paid for $/MWhr.

Yep, straight PPA. It depends on the time of the year.

$49.75 for 3 months, 5 months $61.75 and 4 months $71.85 per MWH.

We just spent 6 weeks refurbishing the plant. Today we produced the full 3.2MW, which has not happened for several years.

[red-beard]

Originally Posted by Laneco

Methane is odorless. The smell is other things...

angela

The smell is horrific! Untreated, the landfill gas is 600PPM H2S.

[red-beard]

Originally Posted by cmccuist

Hi Red Beard!

What made you decide on the Caterpillars? I'm doing a project right now for the University of West Indies in Kingston. We are using the GE Jenbacher line and burning natural gas, but they make biogas units as well.

I'm actually in Budapest this week for the testing. GE has a huge facility here. Really impressive place. These Hungarians can build some generating units!

Existing plant that is about 10 years old. One thing CAT has going for it is a lot of experience in biogas and they have facilities all over the place. One other plus, the CAT units can deal with Siloxanes better than most other recip engines.

Siloxanes are silicon compounds which are found in lots of home products, including silicone caulk and hair care products. They are generally inert. But when burned, they turn into silicon-di-oxide, or Silica. This can plate out on the piston and head, along with everything downstream in the exhaust (Turbo). It is like a ceramic.

At present, no treatment. We're shortly installing a gas chiller which will take out a lot of the siloxanes through condensation. We also plan a water injection system which will prevent deposits.