State Awards $5 Million To Biogas Projects

The Department of Environmental Protection announced $5 million in federal recovery money was awarded to eight alternative energy projects that use biological materials such as sewage, animal and food processing waste to generate enough energy to power more than 80,000 homes.

“By wisely investing our federal stimulus dollars in large-scale alternative energy projects, we are aggressively moving forward to meet our future long-term energy needs, while creating multiple short-term benefits,” said Gov. Rendell. “These projects will put Pennsylvanians to work now constructing long-term assets that will supply residents with a significant amount of electricity for years to come. These projects will stimulate the economy by creating jobs and attracting additional investment capital needed to bring the projects to completion.

“The projects will also develop methods for handling various waste streams in more efficient and environmentally friendly manners. Farmers, food processors and local governments will now be able to better deal with various forms of waste material, use that waste to generate electricity, and in some cases, even using the waste heat generated to make the overall process even more efficient.”

Federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds support the commonwealth's Green Energy Works! Biogas initiative. The projects will leverage an additional $22 million in private investments.

The eight projects receiving grants will generate more than 470,000 megawatt hours of electricity over their lifetimes. That is enough energy to power more than 47,000 average homes in Pennsylvania for one year.

The projects will also generate the equivalent of 3,183 million cubic feet of natural gas — enough to heat more than 37,000 average homes that use about 85,000 cubic feet of gas per year. The projects will also reduce the amount of greenhouse gases emitted by 237,000 tons of carbon dioxide, or the equivalent of taking more than 41,000 passenger vehicles off the roads.

A list of the projects is available online.