In the looking-for-good-news department this article in the SF Chron caught my eye today.

At the Altamont Landfill near Livermore, Waste Management Inc. has installed a $15.5 million system that collects gas given off by decomposing garbage and turns it into fuel. The company unveiled the system on Monday.

Built by German engineering company the Linde Group, the project strips impurities from the gas, chills it to 260 degrees below zero and turns it into a liquid. Specially equipped garbage trucks burn it as fuel. The system can produce as many as 13,000 gallons of liquefied natural gas per day.

I would have like to know more about the economics of doing this.  What does it cost to chill the gas, strip it, store it.  Where does that energy come from, at what economic and environmental cost?  It wouldn’t be quite perpetual motion if the gas collected were enough to collect the gas, with a surplus, as the raw materials of beef carcass, coffee grounds and last night’s dinner are constantly being supplied, but what is the reduction in waste?  I don’t suppose $15.5 million was invested without working through the numbers, but it would be interesting to know.   Next up, feed-lot methane!

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