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Stay up to date with the latest stories, insights, and announcements.Regs and Bacon: North Carolina’s renewable energy mandate is advantageous to pork producers, if conditions are right.
By Anna Simet,
At one time not too long ago, North Carolina was populated with more pigs than people. While that’s no longer true, the state trails only Iowa among pork-producing states, and the industry employs roughly 46,000 North Carolinians, provides $3 billion in annual income and $7 billion in annual sales, and its 2,100 farms—80 percent of which are family-owned—are home to 8.8 million hogs, living on farms that range from 250 to 50,000 head.
For the past two decades, the industry has been increasingly regulated, as a way to manage hog waste and improve and preserve environmental quality. In 1997, a moratorium was placed on the expansion of existing hog farms and the development of new ones. Fast-forward 10 years later, and the moratorium became permanent, with a provision that new permits could be issued only to farms that meet five environmental performance standards: Elimination of discharge of animal waste to surface waters and groundwater through direct discharge, seepage or runoff, as well as substantial elimination of atmospheric emissions of ammonia, emissions of odor detectable beyond the boundaries of the parcel or tract of land on which the farm is located, the release of disease-transmitting vectors and airborne pathogens, and of nutrient and heavy metal contamination of soil or groundwater.
California to issue rules on methane leaks
By Timothy Cama, The Hill.
California regulations have agreed to develop a regulation limiting the amount of methane that oil and natural gas companies can emit.
The state’s Air Resources Board voted late Thursday to move forward on the rule after the months-long leak at an underground gas storage facility north of Los Angeles, Capital Public Radio reported.
"We did not have a regulation in place that covered the methane emissions," says Mary Nichols, the board's chairman, said at a meeting. "We worked with the company to try to get them to voluntarily mitigate for the impacts."
DOE to fund projects combining biofuel and engine research
By Erin Voegele, Biomass Magazine.
The U.S. Department of Energy has announced its intent to issue a funding opportunity announcement (FOA) entitled “Co-Optimization of Fuels and Engines.”
Green State, Golden State: The Fight to Save Cap-and-Trade
By Bill Raden, Capital & Main.
For Sacramento, July is traditionally the calm before the storm — when state lawmakers and lobbyists desert the capital during the summer recess to brace for August’s legislative onslaught and its end-of-the-month deadline for bills headed to the governor’s desk. This year, however, the lights have remained on in both the offices of Governor Jerry Brown and the state’s powerful oil lobby.
Also See: Green State, Golden State: Clean Energy Policy Creates Good Jobs
Earlier this month, Brown and Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA) president Catherine Reheis-Boyd confirmed reports of ongoing direct talks between the governor and oil industry groups over what a Brown spokesperson told Capital & Main in a carefully worded email statement was an extension of “the state’s cap-and-trade program and climate goals beyond 2020.” The statement said talks were taking place for the sake of “market certainty” and to “ensure ongoing funding for clean energy programs, especially in vulnerable communities.”
A similarly vague message from Reheis-Boyd said only that the talks were aimed at “improving the state’s current programs and ensuring legislative oversight concerning the decisions that will determine California’s next course of action to combat climate change.” (Another oil group, the California Independent Oil Marketers Association, did not respond to a request for comment.)
Ag Groups Urge California to delay cap-and-trade extension, changes
By Tim Hearden, Capital Press.
SACRAMENTO — Farm groups want state leaders to hold off on a proposed expansion of California’s cap-and-trade program, which they say already has placed burdens on producers.
Representatives from groups including the California Farm Bureau Federation and Western United Dairymen say Gov. Jerry Brown and lawmakers should wait until closer to the program’s 2020 sunset before considering whether to extend it.
Cynthia Cory, the CFBF’s director of environmental affairs, noted that California is still the only place in the world where such a program exists even though state leaders were confident that others would follow.
Pat Sullivan of SCS Engineers Helps Unpack the EPA’s New NSPS and EG Landfill Rules
By Mallory Szczepanski, Waste 360.
Members of the waste and recycling industry are knee-deep in reviewing the details of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) final rules, which were released last Fridayin an effort to help reduce methane emissions in municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills.
Currently, MSW landfills are ranked the second largest industrial source of methane emissions in the U.S., but the new rules are expected to cut methane emissions by approximately 334,000 tons a year starting in 2025. These rules are part of President Obama’s Climate Action Plan: Strategy to Reduce Methane Emissions, and they serve as an update to the 1996 standards for existing landfills and strengthen the proposed rule for new landfills that was issued in 2014.
“Last week, the EPA released pre-publication copies of two rules: the Final New Source Performance Standards (NSPS) and the Final Updates to Emission Guidelines (EG),” says Patrick Sullivan, senior vice president of SCS Engineers in Sacramento, Calif. “The first thing that members of the industry need to do is figure out which rule applies to them, find out if they are considered a ‘new landfill’ or not based on the new definition and move forward from there.”
Los Angeles County landfill looks at anaerobic digestion as way to expand site's lifespan
By Cole Rosengren, Waste Dive.
Dive Brief:
- The City Council of Glendale, CA unanimously agreed to conduct a study on the feasibility of building an anaerobic digester at the Scholl Canyon Landfill to process yard waste.
- Current options include using the gas to generate electricity at the city's Grayson Power Plant, selling the gas, or flaring it. The Grayson plant has been using methane gas from the landfill for power since the 1990s.
- Waste Resources Inc. and OWS, Inc. will conduct the study, which is expected to take six months.
Republic Services and Mas Energy Unveil Latest Renewable Energy Project
Via 3BL Media.
ATLANTA, July 21, 2016 — Republic Services, Inc. and Mas Energy, LLC unveiled today a new renewable energy project serving Metro Atlanta. The innovative project involves landfill gas-to-energy facilities at three area landfills, located in the cities of Buford, Griffin and Winder. Together, these facilities are capable of generating 24.1 megawatts of electricity, or enough renewable energy to power 15,665 households.
“We believe in leading by example in everything we do,” said Jamey Amick, area president of Republic Services. “The modern landfill presents new opportunity to harness energy from yesterday’s waste and convert it to meettomorrow’s energy needs. We are proud to partner once again with Mas Energy to generate a renewable energy source that makes a meaningful and lasting environmental difference in the state of Georgia.”
Landfill gas-to-energy projects like these involve capturing methane, a byproduct of the normal decomposition of waste, from the subsurface and routing the methane to a series of engines. These engines convert the methane into electricity, which can be distributed to the local power grid.
GAO says feds should strengthen federal-land methane accounting
By Timothy Cama, The Hill.
The Interior Department needs to take numerous steps to improve the way it measures methane emissions from oil and natural gas wells on federal land, a watchdog report found.
The Government Accountability Office found numerous problems and inconsistencies in the instructions the Bureau of Land Management gives to companies to report their methane emissions.
"As a result of these limitations, Interior may not have a consistent accounting of natural gas emissions from onshore federal leases, and does not have the information it needs to reasonably ensure it is minimizing waste on these leases," the report said.
Report features data on EU pellet, biogas markets
By Erin Voegele, Biomass Magazine.
A report recently filed with the USDA Foreign Agriculture Service’s Global Agricultural Information Network provides an overview of the European Union’s biofuel market, including data on wood pellets and biogas.
Regarding pellets, the report explains that the EU is the world’s largest wood pellet market, with approximately 20.5 million metric tons of pellets consumed in 2015, with approximately 65 percent of that volume used for heat and 35 percent for power. Demand is expected to increase to 22.5 million metric tons in 2017. The EU currently accounts for approximately 75 percent of the global market for wood pellets. The EU is also the world’s biggest producer of pellets, featuring approximately 50 percent of global production. When compared to North American pellet plants, however, EU plants are primarily small- or medium-sized.
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