Rhode Island's First Commercial-scale Anaerobic Digester Could be Model for NE Region

By Tim Faulkner, ecoRI News.

JOHNSTON, R.I. — Rhode Island’s first commercial-scale anaerobic digester still isn’t ready, but company officials say it's getting closer to completion. And when it’s operational, New England's largest digester may be a test case for similar facilities in neighboring states with food-diversion laws.

Rhode Island’s compost law, passed in 2014, requires large institutions such as supermarkets and food makers to divert their organic scrap to a farm, food pantry, compost facility or anaerobic digester, as long as such a facility exists within 15 miles. So far, only a smaller-scale compost facility is operating in Charlestown — Earth Care Farm has been composting food scrap for 40 years. The Compost Plant has proposed a facility in Warren.

In recent years, smaller digesters have been built in Massachusetts that service a single facility, like a Stop & Shop distribution warehouse in Freetown, Mass. In Dartmouth, Mass., a 12-ton-per-day food scrap to biogas anaerobic digestion facility opened in 2014 at the Crapo Hill Landfill. A single digester, or digesters, intended to serve an entire state or region has yet to materialize.

Read more...

Previous
Previous

Industry Leaders Share Expertise on Renewable Natural Gas Business Development in California

Next
Next

Bipartisan Group of 38 Senators Send Joint Letter to EPA Urging Pruitt to Issue Strong 2018 RVO Volumes