High-Strength Waste to Biogas Facility

This bio-energy product developer wanted to implement a waste-to-energy facility that treats food/beverage manufacturing waste from multiple food producers at a central facility and generates electricity. We designed this regional waste-to-energy combined heat and power (CHP) facility, which treats 500,000 gallons of high-strength liquid and solid waste trucked in from food and beverage processing facilities—dairy, brewery, and more—in the region. Two 2-million-gallon high-rate anaerobic digesters generate 1,100 SCFM of biogas, which is treated and then burned in two internal combustion engines to generate electricity. The anaerobic effluent is further treated with a moving bed aerobic bioreactor and dissolved air flotation (DAF) system prior to discharge to the city sewer. Our team also provided construction-related services to help bring the system online. The system can generate 3.2 MW, which is sold to the grid. 362 MMBtu/day of heat is captured from the engines and available for use at the adjacent food processing facilities. Leftover solids are dried and sold as fertilizer to area farmers. The regional waste-to-energy facility cuts approximately 100,000 tons of annual carbon dioxide-equivalent greenhouse gas emissions.