Cowlitz PUD pulls plug on $40 million Headquarters methane-to-power project

Utility cites, rebukes state Department of Ecology for 'flawed' air pollution analysis; project demise would allow landfill to continue releasing tons of pollutants

The Cowlitz PUD announced it has indefinitely suspended its $40 million methane gas-to-energy project at the the county-owned Headquarters Landfill even before breaking ground.

The utility said the state Department of Ecology’s demands for installation of extra emissions control equipment made the project unaffordable.

“This additional equipment introduced costs and risks that made the project economically unfeasible for the community. While the joint venture aimed at diversifying the PUD's energy resources was promising, the technical and financial risks began to outweigh the rewards with this additional requirement,” the PUD said in a prepared statement.

The project was going to be fueled by burning methane — a potent greenhouse gas that is a natural byproduct of decaying landfill waste. The PUD is partnering with Cowlitz County, which owns the landfill and already captures methane and burns it off in a flare system . This process reduces methane emissions to less potent heat-absorbing gases, but the heat produced is wasted in the atmosphere. 

Demise of the PUD project would allow tons of the other pollutants to continue occurring.

Methane, which is highly flammable, was to be burned in combustion engines to produce 8.6 megawatts of power, equivalent to about 1% of the PUD’s needs and enough to supply 4,500 homes, according to PUD estimates.

PUD spokeswoman Alice Dietz said Ecology’s pollution control demands would increase the project’s cost of producing electricity by 26%, from $66 a megawatt hour to $83. The project’s capital and annual operating and maintenance expenses would also increase by 20% and 30%, respectively, Dietz said by email Monday.

The public utility is warning that Ecology’s stance could make it uneconomical to build any landfill gas-to energy plants in Washington.

The project was not expected to cost PUD ratepayers anything because it was to be funded with grants and other incentives, including $4.9 million available under the state methane landfill reduction program. That program is funded by the 2021 Washington state Climate Commitment Act, which taxes businesses’ greenhouse gas emissions.

Abandoning the project would not leave the PUD short of power because the output from the Headquarters project was to be sold to other utilities, according to the PUD.

Cowlitz County will continue its operation of the landfill gas collection and flare system.

The PUD announced the project in May due to media inquires. Even at that time, though, the utility was already jostling with Ecology over how to control air pollution emissions. The PUD even warned then that it might have to abandon the project due to the agency’s demands, according to documents I obtained through the state Open Records Act.

The debate centered on what should be considered “best available control technology (BACT)” for limiting emissions of carbon monoxide and siloxane.

Carbon monoxide is a byproduct of burning fossil fuels and many other materials.

Siloxane is one of the more controversial chemicals in the industrialized world today, especially in the silicone industry, according to Ace Laboratories. It is a very useful chemical, but some forms have been banned by Canada and the European Union as class 1 endocrine disruptors that can cause hormone imbalances, thyroid disease, and other autoimmune diseases, Ace reports.

Determining BACT is a complex analysis partly shaped by costs, levels of existing pollution and economic factors in addition to the state and efficiency of air pollution control technology. BACT determination thus is something of a policy and judgment call, not a technological absolute.

Ecology spokesman Andrew Wineke Monday said the agency’s requirement to use “catalytic oxidizer” control technology on the Headquarters project would reduce emissions of carbon monoxide by 75 tons annually and volatile organic compounds (siloxane is a common VOC) by 90 tons a year.

Those sound like big reductions, but they are modest. The carbon monoxide savings are equal to the annual emissions of 260 cars, for example.

Ecology’s analysis shows that the Headquarters project would still be economically viable using the “catalytic oxidizer” air pollution controls, Wineke said. If the technology is financially feasible, it must be considered the best available control technology, he said.

Grant money still is available and Ecology wants to continue working with the PUD to get the project going, Wineke added.

The PUD officially iced the project in late June, when its power resource manager, Andrew Davis, notified Ecology through an email of disappointment and rebuke.

“Our air quality technical and legal experts continue to advise us that Ecology's BACT determination is technically and legally flawed and reaches cost effectiveness conclusions that are not supportable.

“Furthermore, we believe that Ecology's current flawed BACT determination could set a precedent that would preclude other landfill gas recovery projects from occurring in the state, which is an unfortunate outcome (given) …. the state's desire to promote landfill gas recovery, “ according to Davis’s June 27 email.

This dispute is highly complex and arcane, even for power managers. I’m not going to pretend to understand right now how the two sides arrived at different conclusions. Some of the explanation lies in the fact that projects like this have little or no real precedent in Washington.

“Ecology is requiring that oxidation catalysts are installed on the exhaust of the internal combustion engines (that would burn the methane). The addition of oxidation catalysts requires that the siloxanes are removed ... prior to combustion, which is cost prohibitive,” said Dietz, the PUD spokeswoman.

Landfill gas-to energy plants are common in California, and some use catalytic oxidizer air pollution controls. But they are more financially viable because utilities there can sell power for more than four times the rate the PUD could charge for power generated at the Headquarters project, according to the PUD and its attorneys.

The PUD also notes that its project is located in a sparsely populated rural area south of Silver Lake that is in compliance with clean air standards.

Furthermore, the more advanced air pollution control equipment likely would break down more often, leading more shutdowns and reduced power sales revenues, the PUD contends.

The unfortunate thing about the looming demise of this project is that the county’s flaring system will indefinitely continue belching pollutants into the air. It makes no sense. Something is better than nothing.

Are both sides playing chicken, making gambits that the other side will give in? Ecology in recent years has not been kind to Cowlitz County, having moved the regulatory goal posts several times before finally killing the methanol plant proposed at the Port of Kalama in 2021, for example.

The two sides need to continue talking. Reducing climate-altering gases has become politically fraught even among parties that agree it’s a problem. You’ve heard the impediments. A wind farm kills birds and whales or destroys a view. Solar farms take up too much space. Hydro storage projects encroach on ancestral Indian lands.

If our society can’t agree on a relatively small and unobjectionable project, how on earth can we collectively keep our planet from cooking?

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