Environmental Services Sector

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>>> Republic Services landfill near Pearland houses one of nation's largest renewable natural gas plants


By Chris Mathews

Houston Business Journal

Apr 25, 2022


https://www.bizjournals.com/houston/news/2022/04/25/republic-services-morrow-energy-renewable-gas.html?ana=yahoo


They say one man's trash is another man's treasure, and the adage rings loud and clear at a landfill gas-to-energy plant south of Houston.

The 1,700-acre Blue Ridge Landfill, operated by Phoenix-based Republic Services Inc. (NYSE: RSG) off FM 521 just west of Shadow Creek Ranch, handles around 6,500 tons of waste each day, said Operations Manager Zac Pedersen. Blue Republic Services collection trucks move about the landfill in continual motion throughout the man-made hills, unloading waste collected from across the Houston metro region.

As the trucks come and go, they pass by hundreds of extraction wells rising out of the capped, soil-covered areas of the landfill. Drilled between 30 and 65 feet into the matured portions of the landfill, around 550 wells capture methane, carbon dioxide and other gases that are piped to an on-site renewable natural gas plant operated by Midland, Texas-based Morrow Energy Inc.

"That trash will heat up [and] begin to decompose. At that point, the generation of methane begins," said Raymond Whitlock, environmental manager at Blue Ridge. "We jump on that proactively here."

One of around 550 gas extraction points drilled into the capped, mature portions of the Blue Ridge Landfill. These wells and vacuums capture methane, CO2 and other gases from the depths of the landfill to produce renewable natural gas.

Blue Ridge isn't your average landfill — it's also one of the largest of 77 landfill renewable natural gas (RNG) projects in the nation, according to data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. After separating methane from the unwanted portions of the landfill gas stream, most of that methane goes into RNG production instead of being flared off. The gas flow to Morrow Energy's plant at Blue Ridge Landfill is between 7,000 and 7,500 cubic feet per minute, said Morrow Energy founder and President Paul Morrow.

The RNG produced at Morrow's Blue Ridge Landfill plant eventually ends up as transportation fuel. Under the federal Renewable Fuel Standard program, refiners are required to reduce the quantity of petroleum-based transportation fuel or replace petroleum fuel with certain volumes of renewable fuel, including the cellulosic biofuel produced at Blue Ridge.

"The key for the Renewable Fuel Standard is it has to end up on the road," Morrow said.

Some of the RNG goes to powering Republic's own fleet of compressed natural gas vehicles. Around 21% of the company's fleet operated on CNG at the end of 2021, Republic said in its latest annual report. Besides its use as a transportation fuel, RNG can be used in thermal applications, to generate electricity and as a bio-based feedstock.

Raymond Whitlock, environmental manager at Blue Ridge Landfill, greets one of the longhorns living near the landfill. Republic Services actively monitors for groundwater and methane leakage nearby.

Scaling trash-to-gas

In addition to landfills, other sources of RNG production include the degradation of manure and other organic matter on farms or other agricultural interests. The number of total landfill RNG and agricultural RNG projects in the U.S. has risen drastically over just the past few years, from 52 total projects in 2017 to 174 projects in 2021, according to the EPA.

But there are several barriers preventing RNG from scaling up as an even larger source of renewable fuels, including project availability and cost issues. Perhaps the biggest barrier to growth is the fact that there are a limited number of landfills and agricultural sites from which to capture methane needed to produce RNG, Morrow said.

"You're not going to accidentally discover a new landfill like you might a new oil and gas field," Morrow said. "We've got a lot to do, and most of the sites are going to be smaller and incrementally more challenging to do economically."

Developing a landfill RNG plant also takes a lot of money. Morrow Energy invested tens of millions of dollars to develop its Blue Ridge capabilities, Morrow said. Beyond the capital requirements to build and operate a landfill gas plant, RNG has to try to compete on pricing with natural gas, which has been difficult to do. Buyers have typically shied away from paying a premium for a greener gas option, opting instead for fossil fuel natural gas.

"We've had to try to live at spot prices. We've had times where we lost money for three years, years we've made a lot of money," Morrow said. "It's not real inducive to financial investment because of the ups and downs."

But given the drastic rise in global natural gas prices over the past year and the amount of investment focused on a clean energy transition, Morrow sees a more competitive market for RNG going forward.

"There's a lot more interest from people in this business, but there are very few people that have the experience to do it," Morrow said.

The Houston region is home to other large landfill RNG projects, including at the Coastal Plains Recycling and Disposal Facility in Alvin and Republic's McCarty Road landfill in Houston.

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