| Ann Arbor Business Review - Brighton Company`s Plan: Sewage + Garbage = Profits - 6/06 |
CTI and Associates Inc. is developing a bioreactor at a St. Clair County landfill that will speed the decomposition of organic garbage by injecting it with septic-tank waste.
If the pilot project goes as expected, it could be a big win for CTI, which has a number of patents on the process, as well as landfill owners, who can collect more methane from the decomposing garbage and charge for the disposal of septic waste for additional revenue.
And because the trash will decompose much faster, landfills can be built smaller and even reused. Communities will also win because there will be an alternative to dumping the sludge at wastewater treatment plants or on farm fields, the two approved methods in Michigan.
"In my opinion, this is a great thing," said Wes Sherman, solid waste engineering coordinator for the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality.
"We have a very willing facility and this is going to be very well studied." He said he has no doubt the system will work but it`s not clear how much waste will be required or what kinds of instrumentation will be needed, among other concerns.
The study will take several years for CTI, a 30-year-old firm with 80 employees and an anticipated $10 million in revenues this year, according to president Morgan Subbarayan. The idea of a bioreactor landfill - a landfill injected with liquids - is not new and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has several test sites. However, building a complete system to handle septic-tank waste is new. The study at the Smiths Creek landfill involves building two, three-acre garbage-disposal sites, injecting one with regular landfill-generated liquids and the other with bacteria-laden septic waste. Subbarayan said that four years of data collection by the company have shown that wet garbage deteriorates faster than garbage in standard dry landfills.
The study will determine how much faster septic waste works than landfill liquids to decompose garbage and form methane gas. Subbarayan believes treated garbage - with the aid of naturally occurring microbes that speed digestion - will deteriorate at least 10 times faster than garbage in a regular landfill.
Sherman said it`s not clear how much septic waste each landfill can handle.
The study will also determine how to control odor and other potential nuisances.
"The possibility of this becoming big business is high," said Subbarayan, who noted that this will be the first system of its kind ever built.
"We are expecting the big (landfill) companies to negotiate with us."
CTI estimates that if the system were operational at one of the three-acre cells, the landfill could generate $250,000 per year from septic waste-disposal fees and collect about $1 million in methane gas annually, enough to heat 800 homes for 10 years at historic average rates.
Also, the landfill would save at least $2 million in expansion costs.
Septic-waste disposal is a big problem in Macomb and St. Clair counties. CTI said there are about 50,000 septic tanks that generate 9.5 million gallons of waste every year, a number that is expected to rise to 14 million by 2030.
However, there are no approved wastewater plants to accept the material.
CTI`s system can be used to retrofit current lined landfills or build into new ones. It`s an elaborate system of pipes and pumps and collection and storage sites and it does not require a person to handle the waste.
There are 50 landfills in Michigan alone that could be candidates for the technology, Sherman said.
The Environmental Protection Agency said there were more than 1,700 active landfills in the U.S. in 2002. While the number of landfills is declining, their size is increasing.
Subbarayan estimated that retrofitting would cost several million dollars but payback would be fairly fast.
CTI is a consulting engineering firm with offices in Port Huron, Pittsburgh and Cleveland, Wis. It specializes in land development, landfill design and environmental engineering.
The company`s revenues grew 45 percent to $7.5 million last year, Subbarayan said.
By Brian Hamilton |
