Monday, November 14, 2011

US to site renewable energy projects at landfills - City of Saskatoon leading the way

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) have jointly announced plans to evaluate the feasibility of siting solar, wind, biomass, and geothermal facilities on 26 Superfund sites and former landfill and mining sites. The EPA is providing $1 million USD in technical assistance to conduct the feasibility studies at the sites, according to Lura Matthews, who heads the agency’s "RE-Powering America’s Land" project. "Owners of the sites are mixed; a lot of them are municipal governments, and some are privately owned," Matthews told the audience at the PV Power Generation Mid-West & East conference in New York City during the week of November 7, 2011. The sites, which are in various stages of assessment or cleanup, do not need to be completely remediated before renewable energy development can begin on them, she added. "If they are cleaning groundwater on the site, for example, there may still be part of the site where you can put solar panels."

Saskatoon Light & Power issued an RFP on November 8, 2011 for a utility-scale 2 MW wind turbine at the municipal landfill in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada as part of the new Green Energy Park. The RFP closes December 8, 2011. The site will be only the third in the world to construct a utility scale wind turbine with a floating foundation on top of municipal solid waste - the other two projects are in Boston and Germany.

Source: (in part) Climate Change Business Bulletin

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