Comments about ‘Your trash produces landfill gas’

That is the coolest article I have read today.

Chemistry fail! Methane is an odorless gas.

Methane does not give off an odor. The smell usually associated with rotting comes from sulfur in various compounds. Aside from that, it's great that Murray is taking advantage of this opportunity.

Awesome story!

but not totally new. When I was a kid over 60 years ago in southern Indiana, our local electricity plant was fueled by steam--generated by burning garbage! Don't know whether it could work today or not, but somebody might do some research. Seems silly to me to bury burnable material that could be used to produce energy. If the methane method is easier, cheaper, and cleaner--then go for it.

Burning garbage for energy is still used, but our problem today is that we have so much plastic in our garbage that the chemical releases are rather toxic. In the developing world, I've seen incinerators in people yards where they burn their garbage because they don't have garbage pick up. The consequence is a release of such toxic proportions that it hurts the health of locals and of course without adequate healthcare, the populous suffers.

Clearly, using our garbage to generate electricity is part of our energy future.

Actually, Davis County has a burn plant in Clearfield and the output from that operation is very clean except CO2 and H2O.

There are some obvious "feel good" aspects of this story that may not necessarily be completely accurate. For example, the statement that some landfills just burn off methane increasing pollution must be qualified. Methane potential for greenhouse effect is 23 times more "polluting" than the CO2 resulting from burning it. That same CO2 is released by this electricity generation plant making it neither better nor worse than the one that just flares it off but both are better than just letting it ooze out into the atmosphere.

No, the real advantage this system has over the flare off option is that by utilizing the heat generated by combustion, we now have some electricity available that otherwise would have had to be generated by some other, perhaps, polluting source. It still comes down to a cost comparison. Considering the life expectancy of the equipment, is it less expensive than, say, solar?

I did not see a complete cost figure or cost per megawatt over the lifecycle of the equipment. Why not?

I'm looking forward to the fees at the dump coming down. Thank you.

First off, Dianne, as a representative to the Governor you should know better than to claim Utah a leader in Methane gas production. About 15 years ago companies like Northern Illinois Gas and Commonwealth Edison tapped garbage in numerous dumps to produce methane gas energy. This was done with the cooperation of communities in Northern Illinois and working with Naval authorities involving a base closure. This technology has been used for years in other states as well. So please don't claim something that is not true! Just take credit for catching up!
Secondly, Costs associated with this will rise as well, but at a slower level. Pay raises and equipment costs will continue to rise so the fees will not be stagnant but will increase.
Congradulations on your accomplishment!

So do beans...

We need more projects like this in the state.

I read these message boards to get a sense of what the reation is to the aritcles. I'm mostly disappointed to read the polemic and essentially useless posts that do not lead to a greater understanding of the issue.

Spoc's post above is a rare exception. I didn't know or hadn't thought of some of the ideas he or she presented. That is real benefit from reading readers' comments.

As to the topic, I'm glad that we are seeing more articles about solving our most urgent problem - energy. The development of a sustainable substitute for fossil fuels is the US's only hope at retaining our quality of life.