RNG NEWS
Stay up to date with the latest stories, insights, and announcements.Power to the poop: one Colorado city is using human waste to run its vehicles
By Melanie Sevcenko, The Guardian.
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.
Republican Presidential Field Tilts Rightward on Climate Change
By Amy Harder and Beth Reinhard, The Wall Street Journal.
Shortly after a conservative website on Wednesday posted 2008 footage of Sen. Marco Rubio backing a cap-and-trade program to combat climate change, his campaign roared back with a counterattack that included an entire web page aimed at debunking the video.
Mr. Rubio’s muscular response revealed how toxic the issue of climate change has become in the Republican Party under President Barack Obama, who has sought to make reducing carbon emissions to alleviate global warming one of his signature accomplishments.
As speaker of the Florida House, Mr. Rubio did vote for a 2008 bill authorizing the state to come up with rules for a cap-and-trade plan, though he raised questions about its cost and effectiveness. A press release from the House Majority Office at the time described the bill as a “responsible response to concerns about global climate change.”
EPA: Clean energy adds jobs
By John Seewer, Associated Press, via The Columbus Dispatch.
PERRYSBURG, Ohio — Ohio and other states that are pushing back against clean energy are missing a chance to add jobs and revive their economy, the head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said this week.
EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said moving toward solar and wind energy is not just good for the environment.
“People need to understand clean energy is here,” she said on Thursday while touring a solar plant near Toledo, where about 6,000 people in the region work in the industry. “It’s growing jobs; it’s creating innovation.”
Oregon lawmakers introduce cap-and-trade bill, but success seen doubtful
By Stian Reklev and Mike Szabo, Carbon Pulse.
Two Oregon state senators on Thursday introduced draft legislation that would establish a state-wide cap-and-trade scheme from 2020, but sources said the bill stands little chance of surviving.
The Healthy Climate Act, introduced by Democrats Chris Edwards and Lee Beyer, would establish a carbon market to help Oregon meet a target of cutting GHG emissions to 75% below 1990 levels by 2050. It would also set intermediary targets of 20% below 1990 levels by 2025, and 45% below by 2035.
But a legislative source told Carbon Pulse that, in light of a recent agreement between the state’s largest utilities and environmental campaigners to all but phase out the use of coal-fired power by 2030, he would be surprised if the Edwards-Beyer bill made it out of committee.
The candidates and media are getting the Iowa ethanol debate all wrong
By Michelle Ye Hee Lee, The Washington Post.
Question: “Are you going to jerk the rug right out from underneath it, or are you going to let it expire in 2022 like it should, and then stand on its own?” […]
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.): “Maggie, you rightly noted that the RFS is set to expire in 2022. When I said we should phase it out, I said it should be a five-year phase-out — a phase-out from 2017 to 2022 is five years.”
—exchange during a campaign event in Cherokee, Iowa, Jan. 6, 2016
Voters in corn-growing Iowa have confronted Cruz about his stance against the federal renewable-fuel mandate, which sets the minimum amount of corn-based ethanol to be mixed into gasoline to reduce or replace the amount of fossil fuel.
Energy Bill Faces Tough Hurdles As Prices Fall During Election Year
By Gary Truitt, Hoosier Ag Today.
The Senate GOP leadership calls the energy bill that the Energy Committee passed with a bipartisan 18-4 vote last July “a leading contender” for floor debate early this year. Energy Committee Chair Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, is eager to lead that debate, hoping for Senate passage by March. If the Senate passes the Murkowski/Cantwell Energy Policy Modernization Act, S. 2012, the next step will be a House/Senate conference to merge that bill with the North American Energy Security and Infrastructure Act, H.R. 8, which the House passed Dec. 3 in a 249-174 vote.
But prospects for finalizing an energy bill this year face four major hurdles:
Congress may pass bipartisan energy bill this year, key senator predicts
By Erin Kelly, USA Today.
BALTIMORE — Congress could send a sweeping energy bill to President Obama's desk with bipartisan support this year, the chairman of the Senate Republican Policy Committee predicted Thursday at a GOP congressional retreat.
Although few major bills are expected to clear the Senate in this election year, Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wy., said he believes the energy bill can pass the divided chamber with strong support from senators of both parties. The Senate has 54 Republicans, 44 Democrats and two independents.
BioHiTech America collaborates to convert food waste to energy
BioHiTech Global Inc., a green technology company that provides an innovative data-driven solution for food waste disposal, announced that its subsidiary, BioHiTech America, has partnered with Natural Systems Utilities, Ridgewood Green RME and the village of Ridgewood, New Jersey, to test a process that will allow BioHiTech's Eco-Safe Digester to digest, tank, and deliver the effluent from its Eco-Safe Digesters to anaerobic digestion (AD) facilities anywhere in the world.
BioHiTech's Eco-Safe Digester utilizes an aerobic digestion process to convert food waste to grey water, also referred to as effluent. Typically the effluent is discharged safely into the sewage system and individual wastewater treatment facilities to treat it with other sanitary waste. This new process will tank the unit's effluent allowing for transportation to an anaerobic digestion plant where biogas can be captured and used to create renewable energy.
Renewable Hydrogen From Tri-Generation Fuel Cells Included Under California LCFS
By Globe Newswire.
- Distributed renewable hydrogen solution receives contingent approval for Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) Credit Market to sell or trade credits
- Using stationary fuel cells to convert biogas from wastewater treatment into renewable hydrogen, power, and heat (tri-generation), offsetting carbon emissions
- LCFS enhances tri-generation fuel cell economic value proposition while supporting renewable transportation infrastructure and California Senate Bill 1505 (SB 1505)\
Florida Keys may use gasification of yard waste for electricity generation
By Robert Carr, Waste 360.
The Florida Keys islands, known for their lush tropical palm trees and extensive coral reefs, may sign off on a plan this spring to convert its residents’ yard waste to electricity through gasification, in a cost-saving effort to reduce greenhouse gases.
Monroe County, which encompasses Key West and about 95 percent of the rest of the Keys islands, is finalizing a contract with Annapolis, Md.-based Energy3 LLC to build a gasification plant capable of processing 50,000 tons of organic material. The county had sought an RFP in 2014 to improve the sustainability of its yard waste elimination program, and signed a roughly $7 million contract then with Energy3 to examine building the plant. The county’s Board of Commissioners plan to meet Wednesday with the company to go over final terms for the contract.
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