Project aims to convert grease into power

Project aims to convert grease into power

By ERIC LINDBERG — Feb. 3, 2010

Grease and fat collected by local restaurants may soon be generating energy to power the city of Santa Barbara’s wastewater plant, potentially cutting down electricity costs and eliminating the need to truck the waste to distant facilities.

City leaders unanimously greenlighted a pilot project yesterday to convert what is known in the industry as FOG — or fats, oil and grease — into methane gas through a digestion process at El Estero Wastewater Treatment Plant.

“This is something that will be an incredible boon for local restaurant owners and will help boost our energy output at El Estero considerably,” said Councilmember Das Williams.

The pilot program would receive up to 5,000 gallons of waste collected in grease traps at local restaurants. After a waste hauler — likely MarBorg Industries — runs the grease through a pretreatment process, wastewater staff will inject the waste into a digester.

Bacteria will subsequently eat through the oil and grease, creating mostly methane gas along with some carbon dioxide.

“It’s actually much like the digestive processes that take place in the human body,” said Chris Toth, the city’s wastewater system manager.

City officials plan to convert the gas into energy for the plant, offsetting electricity costs. The program also has the potential to benefit local restaurant operators, who currently pay to haul their grease as far as Bakersfield, Fresno and Watsonville.

Jim Dewey, the city’s facilities and energy manager, said the pilot program could generate additional revenues for the city through tipping fees charged to haulers that bring grease to the facility.

Up to $100,000 could be generated annually through those fees, city officials said, meaning the city would presumably recoup the project’s estimated $410,000 price tag within four years. The pilot program would also yield up to 4,500 kilowatt hours of energy daily.

City officials said fats and grease are typically disposed of in landfills, and a successful pilot program could reduce the 17 metric tons of carbon dioxide created daily by that degrading waste.

Alelia Paranteau, a city energy analyst, said the project would operate for two years, at which point city officials would evaluate its success and possibly expand to a full-scale operation.

If the program proves successful, the city could expand the facility to accept the 20,000 gallons of FOG waste generated daily in the South Coast region. Design work on the pilot program should be completed by the end of the year, with construction work to finish by the end of 2011.

The city council unanimously approved up to $59,400 for design services from AECOM, a Ventura-based engineering firm, in addition to authorizing city staff to negotiate an agreement with MarBorg for hauling and pretreatment of the grease waste.