ERMUSR MICS.ITEMS 11-12-2003 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Northern group eyes Ian M.idpY UMW*May Mpf WYtl Tebbe.nwpt As part of its fact-finding process, Fosston Public Works renewable generation a Director Dave Larson, Assistant Public Works Director Dean De- with enviable record I frang, Darryl Tveitbakk and Da- 1 m i 1 lene Monsebroten of the North- 1 i—,� ern Municipal Power Agency, What started as a wastewater I i and Al Tschepen of Minnkota treatment project for Fosston Power Cooperative Sept. 19 Municipal Utilities may lead to - riII I11I1II!ww iVmom I toured a methane-fueled genera- an electrical generation project. i, I A local agricultural processor r1'n t I J lion project owned by Elk River �1Jf1,1 ills rin IilliE��i'1,'i'� Municipal Utilities. is the city's largest wastewater �........,.� That facility is fueled by customer. Its discharge is high in methane collected at a landfill. biochemical oxygen demand and Elk Myer Iltwelelpal Utilities May 2003 LP)Oi""°"output Three 800 kilowatt dieseleneines total suspended solids. That led IS run continuously at the facility, to issues with the city's waste- providing enough electricity to water lagoons and discussions a. power 1,600 enough elec5riper percent with the Minnesota Pollution power 1,600 homes, 15 percent rr of Elk River's needs. Control Agency. The city had to ..'1' �I i There is room for a fourth en- find a way to effectively deal ! I gine at the landfill power plant. with the wastewater load.Adding I,,. C The utility is attempting to get a an anaerobic pre-treatment 1 ' permit to add the additional gen- process to the wastewater process „ • i — I eration. The fourth engine will was part of the answer. 1 i also push the plant from the While improving the waste- `minor' source category to water process, the pre-treatment j `major.' The permit fee may led to the production of make the project uneconomic. methane–another pollutant to be n."......""1” The city also wheels power for dealt with. measured, and flared off. Once al plant's process. Or, it may a 660 kilowatt wind turbine. The The pre-treatment project is engineers have a handle on how make sense to burn it in an engine initial cost of each engine and the largely complete, at a cost of ap- much methane is produced, fur- to spin a generator and make wind turbine were all roughly proximately$2.3 million. For the ther questions can be answered. electricity. Or, there may be $1,000 per kilowatt. However, next six to 12 months,the amount It may make sense to burn the enough methane to do both. the capacity factor of the wind of methane produced will be methane as part of the agricultur- generation is 18 percent, while the landfill plant is 97 percent. The engines chum out approxi- mately 20 million kilowatt-hours annually while the wind turbine produces I million. The fuel costs for each type of generation, from an environmen- tal perspective, are zero. Mainte- nance costs are equivalent The wind generator displaces an esti- mated 520 tons of coal, the land- fill gas generation 7,884 tons. The governmental subsidy is $0.032 per KWH for the wind generator, $0.00 for the landfill gas generation.