Aug 18 - Evansville Courier & Press

At a time when consumers are facing rising gasoline and natural gas prices, a Vectren subsidiary is looking for energy in an unusual place: a city landfill.

Energy Systems Group, a Vectren subsidiary based in Evansville, will spend $5 million to recover methane gas from a landfill in Johnson City, Tenn. The methane will serve as an alternative energy source for businesses there that had relied on natural gas to power some industrial processes.

"To the extent this is successful, it's good news for consumers," Vectren spokesman Mike Roeder said. "The Department of Energy and other national entities have a strategy of encouraging the use of alternative energy. Here's a company, in ESG, trying to walk the walk."

The site is expected to generate enough energy to power the equivalent of 6,000 homes per year, said Norm Campbell, ESG's marketing director.

Along with gasoline, natural gas has been setting price records throughout the year. Last week, Vectren warned that customers this winter could face higher heating bills if natural gas stays near its current price level. On the New York Mercantile Exchange, natural gas has been trading close to $10 a dekatherm, up significantly from a year ago.

The methane ESG plans to collect from the Tennessee site should help users reduce their energy costs and the risk associated with purchasing gas on the open market, ESG officials said.

"It's a stable, local source of gas," Campbell said. "Through waste products, the city is able to supply its own energy."

ESG is joining a number of other companies that are finding untapped sources of energy in landfills across the country. There are about 380 other sites in the U.S. where landfill gas is being harvested for energy.

"The garbage is being turned into something usable," Campbell said.

So far, two Johnson City, Tenn., businesses have agreed to use the methane for their industrial boiler operations. The Johnson City Medical Center and the local Veterans' Affairs facility plan to use the gas for electricity generation and steam production.

ESG plans to build a 3.5 mile pipeline from the landfill to the two users. Campbell said the pipeline route runs near several other industrial users who may later decide to tap into the alternative energy source.

Campbell said ESG has a contract to use the landfill for gas production for 25 years. The company has estimated the site can produce gas for 20 to 30 years and possibly longer, if the landfill ever begins collecting trash from other cities.

ESG is scouting other landfills where it could implement a similar system to tap into alternative energy sources. Campbell declined to identify any specific sites, but said two potential landfills in Indiana are being looked at in the "conceptual stage."