{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.sanders.senate.gov/vermont/tapping-vermonts-largest-landfill-for-renewable-energy", "Tapping Vermonts Largest Landfill for Renewable Energy", "2016-12-09", "2016", "2016-12", "Independent", "House", "VT", "Bernard Sanders", "S000033", "www.sanders.senate.gov", null, null, "legacy", "Tapping Vermont\u2019s Largest Landfill for Renewable Energy\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\tFriday, December 9, 2016\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\r\nCOVENTRY, Vt.\u2014The Washington Electric Co-op is one of two Vermont electric utilities with a 100 percent renewable energy portfolio, thanks in large part to its 8-megawatt generator fired by waste methane on Vermont\u2019s only operating landfill. Washington Electric\u2019s Coventry landfill facility produces enough electricity from waste methane to power approximately 6,000 homes and generates more than half of Washington Electric\u2019s electricity. As organic landfill waste decomposes, it naturally produces methane. Unless captured and converted to energy, the powerful greenhouse gas either would be released into the atmosphere, or burned off by the landfill operators. \u201cIf no generator was here, the landfill would burn it off in a flare,\u201d said Patricia Richards, general manager for Washington Electric, comparing it to \u201ca great big candlestick literally burning the gas. No electricity is produced and it\u2019s just wasted into the atmosphere.\u201d\u201cWe\u2019re a small cooperative, we\u2019re not-for-profit. We have roughly 11,000 member-customers and the Coventry Landfill project is our anchor power supply resource that serves our membership,\u201d said Richards. \u201cThe power plant serves over half of the energy needs of our membership.\u201dThe idea for this methane generator emerged when Washington Electric Co-op set out to replace the electricity it was buying from the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant. \u201cWe said, \u2018Hey, we want to do renewable power. What about a landfill? Could we build a power plant like this in Vermont and produce renewable power instead of taking power from a Vermont Yankee type resource?\u2019 In 2002, the contract ended with Vermont Yankee and, in 2005, this project came online,\u201d Richards said.Vermont Yankee, which was built in 1972, stopped producing electricity in December 2014. The Coventry generator first came on line with three engines in 2005. Since then, two more engines have been added.The $14.2 million landfill gas-to-energy generator at Coventry \u201ccompletely did away with [our reliance on] Vermont Yankee. We replaced a base-load resource with another base-load resource, which was renewable,\u201d Richards said. \u201cIt runs 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. It\u2019s on all the time,\u201d she said. \u201cSo literally, constantly there\u2019s being electricity produced here.\u201d\u201cThis power is really affordable. It\u2019s the cheapest resource in our mix. It\u2019s six cents a kilowatt hour,\u201d she said.HOW DOES IT WORK?\r\nRichards likes to describe the plant, which employs three Vermonters full-time, in stages. \u201cThe landfill and extraction of gas off of the landfill is stage one. There are several wells that are drilled into the landfill itself. There\u2019s over 80 to 90 wells,\u201d she said. \u201cWe collect all the gas from those wells into one pipe and they come into a staging area outside the Coventry plant. That\u2019s where the actual treatment of the gas begins.\u201d\r\n\u201cAs the gas is collected, it essentially becomes naturally compressed, and it comes off the landfill really, really hot,\u201d she notes. \u201cIt\u2019s 140 degrees.\u201d\u201cThe microbes are doing the decomposition inside the landfill. We collect all that gas \u2026 Basically, water particles start to drip off the gas and the rest of the gas comes into the building,\u201d she said.In the next stage, the gas passes through \u201ca scrubbing system\u201d to remove toxic particles and other pollutants. After the gas is scrubbed, it goes to the engine room to be burned, producing electricity. \u201cWe\u2019ve got five engines and their technical capacity is 1.6 megawatts each,\u201d she said. The facility has proven so effective for Washington Electric and its members that it has been expanded two times \u2013 in 2007 and 2009. The $1.7 million investment currently underway will upgrade the turbines and further improve air quality by installing a new scrubbing system. The methane generator abides by \u201cvery stringent federal and state standards regarding emissions,\u201d Richards said. \u201cWe want to be on as many controls as we can to make sure we are not making pollutants.\u201dTo help finance the project, Washington Electric secured the funding through federal Clean Renewable Energy Bonds, or CREBs. ##", 1, "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z", "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.sanders.senate.gov/vermont/tapping-vermonts-largest-landfill-for-renewable-energy"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 0.8081737905740738, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}