Atlanta Company Plans to Build Waste-to-Energy Plant at Augusta, GA Landfill

SEATTLE (Waste Advantage): It sounds almost too good to be true: An Atlanta-area company plans to buy Augusta’s garbage. But that’s exactly what would happen under a plan by Allied Energy Services, a Conyers, Ga.-based alternative energy company that intends to build a recycling plant at the city landfill. The 55,000-square-foot facility would be capable of converting up to 175,000 tons of trash a year into pinkie-sized pellets that can be burned as biomass fuel or converted into engineered building materials, such as flooring and paneling.

The $38 million waste-to-energy project, expected to be complete by early next year, would be the first of its kind in Georgia. “This is the first in this country, period,” Allied Energy CEO Dean Alford said. “This is a very unique opportunity for Augusta.”

The 85-employee operation, which is awaiting permits from the Georgia Environmental Protection Division, could see construction start by the end of summer, according to Lori Videtto, the director of the Augusta-Richmond County Environmental Services Department, which oversees the city’s 1,200-acre landfill off Deans Bridge Road.

Aside from leasing a 10-acre site at the property’s northwest corner for $40,000 a year, Allied Energy would pay the city 5 cents for every ton of garbage it diverts from the landfill, roughly $8,750 a year at full capacity.

The landfill receives about 390,000 tons of trash annually from counties throughout the region and has an approximate 100-year life expectancy at current volumes, Videtto said. Allied Waste’s removal of 175,000 tons – the equivalent of all regional residential waste – would significantly prolong the facility’s lifespan and enable the county to essentially double-dip on waste fees by levying a 5-cent-per-ton charge on Allied Energy on top of the “tipping fees” it collects from haulers at the scale.

Videtto said the novel concept of reselling trash dovetails with the landfill’s self-supporting “enterprise fund” model. For example, the landfill sells its methane gas – a byproduct of decomposition – as a fuel source to Unimin Corp.’s kaolin mine near Hephzibah.

“Obviously, garbage coming in is a money maker for us. With this processing facility, the garbage still comes across the scale, but we sell a portion to Allied Energy who will run it through their processing plant,” Videtto said. “All the liability lies with them. They are financing it 100 percent – we’re just the landlord.”

Allied Energy, through a limited liability company called “Augusta Waste To Energy,” last month received approval by the Augusta Economic Development Authority to seek up to $68 million through the sale of industrial revenue bonds. Such bonds, a common economic development incentive, do not obligate county taxpayers for the debt but enable borrowers to obtain low-cost financing using the county as a pass-through agent.

Courtesy: https://wasteadvantage.com