Trash can be a major contributor to climate change, slowly emitting greenhouse gases that warm the atmosphere as it decomposes.

But Hampton Roads’ major trash agency says a new project could help shrink its landfill’s carbon footprint – while also earning the agency more money. 

The Southeastern Public Service Authority, or SPSA, is partnering with a private company to capture the greenhouse gases generated by the Regional Landfill in Suffolk, and convert them into a form of fuel called “renewable natural gas,” or RNG. 

Renewable natural gas, also called biogas, can be used as a lower-carbon alternative to replace fossil fuels in the local energy supply. 

“The collection and processing of landfill gas will turn what has been a byproduct of landfill waste into a long-term renewable resource,” Dennis Bagley, SPSA’s executive director, said Wednesday at a ribbon-cutting ceremony. 

The renewable natural gas from the Suffolk landfill is injected directly into a regional natural gas pipeline. Officials say customers for the project will primarily be companies using the gas to fuel large truck and bus fleets that currently run on diesel.

The Suffolk landfill, which the authority is working to expand, receives about 1,300 tons of waste each day from around the Southside.

The landfill naturally produces greenhouse gases from organic material as it decomposes. That includes methane, which is an extremely potent greenhouse gas. 

According to the EPA, methane has a warming effect at least 28 times greater than carbon dioxide, which is the most common greenhouse gas. Landfills account for about 14% of the country’s methane emissions, behind oil and natural gas production and livestock’s digestive processes.

Landfill operators are required by federal and state laws to manage emissions of methane and other gases to limit air pollution. Industry-wide that’s often done by “flaring,” or burning it into the atmosphere, which still emits carbon. 

For years, SPSA has also captured much of its landfill gas and burned it to produce electricity on site, said spokesperson Tressa Preston. That electricity went directly onto the local grid. 

But there are benefits to producing renewable natural gas instead, said Richard Crowther, the vice president for development at Atlanta-based Terreva Renewables, which built and manages the $25 million new facility.

There are more sustainable ways to produce electricity, like using solar and wind resources, he said. Renewable natural gas is a “more innovative way” to specifically replace traditional natural gas in sectors like industrial transportation, where cutting emissions is more difficult. 

“This actually represents one of the key, potentially only way to displace natural gas consumption in a green manner,” Crowther said. “It has a larger multiplier for carbon reduction than you would just displacing electricity off the grid.”

The new renewable natural gas facility compresses and filters the landfill gas to meet traditional natural gas industry standards, and can then be used to power homes or as truck fuel.

Terreva estimates the facility’s output will replace the need for about 2 million gallons of gasoline  per year, the equivalent of taking 4,000 cars off the road. 

The new facility in Suffolk sends the gas directly into an existing TC Energy pipeline that already runs through the landfill, said Preston, the SPSA spokesperson.

Renewable natural gas projects have drawn criticism from environmental groups that argue the process is expensive, provides mostly short-term benefits and requires continued investment in infrastructure still tied to fossil fuels. 

The nonprofit Sierra Club advocates for renewable natural gas to be used only in the hardest sectors of the economy to electrify, like heavy industries.

Preston said SPSA did not spend public money on the facility, which has been operational since August. The authority will receive about 10% of Terreva’s revenue from gas sales.

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