RINGGOLD, Ga. - Catoosa County commissioners want to generate electricity from gases coming off the county's closed landfill, then sell the power to TVA to cover some costs at the dump.
Commissioners voted Aug. 3 to apply for a program through the Tennessee Valley Authority in which they would build a generator to convert methane gas from the landfill into electricity, which they would sell to the utility.
County Financial Officer Carl Henson said he could not discuss details of the plans, but said the county first looked at the program in 2007.
He said he hoped the power generation would cover the $250,000 the county pays annually to maintain the former landfill site.
Based on the price the program pays out, the plant would have to produce 250 kilowatts - 0.02 percent of TVA's Kingston coal plant's capacity - to reach that goal. The amount the county receives depends on whatever deal it reaches with North Georgia Electric Membership Co-op, which owns the power lines connecting to the TVA grid.
"The possibilities are great," said Commissioner Dewayne Hill, who called the program a "good venture" for the county. "Even if you break even, you still come out ahead."
Mike Bradley, a spokesman for TVA, said the government-run utility has not received Catoosa's application, but had seen paperwork for 119 other operations during the current application period.
TVA has approved about 390 systems for generation and sell-back through current and past programs. Most of the enrollees are small solar systems, but 23 are municipal-sized operations and seven of those are using landfill gas.
He said the program, which allows generation partners to sell power back to TVA at rates higher than the normal retail prices, has been more popular than expected.
"It is a very good incentive," Henson said.
DeKalb County, Ga., an Atlanta suburb, brings in $100,000 per month selling electricity generated from landfill gas to Georgia Power, according to Billy Malone, assistant director of DeKalb's sanitation department. The generator started churning in October 2006 and the county expected to break even on its $5 million investment in five years.
But the project is ahead of the financial schedule, Malone said, and it will probably be paid off early.
"We're just at the payoff point," he said.
DeKalb County's plant churns out about 22,500 megawatts per year and still burns off nearly half the gas from the field, he said.
Henson mentioned Dekalb County as a model, but said the Catoosa County operation would be much smaller.