In 1000s of landfills across the nation natural gas (primarily methane) is being allowed to drift into the atmosphere or worse yet “flared”. They should be at least using this to generate electricity. Like this landfill in Brevard County.

http://www.brevardcounty.us/swr/landfilltour.cfm

Your Guide to the Central Disposal Facility

The Central Disposal Facility (CDF) is located on Adamson Road in Cocoa. The property was first used for solid waste disposal in the 1960’s. Since then the County has continued to make improvements operationally and environmentally. For example, the 192-acre permitted landfill area is lined by a clay slurry wall, groundwater monitoring wells have been installed, and a methane gas collection and flare system is in place.

The site originally consisted of 285 acres. CDF now totals 957 acres. Portions of the landfill have been closed by capping it with a liner, two feet of cover dirt, and sod. It is estimated Brevard County will have enough landfill capacity to handle the disposal needs for the county until 2014.

In addition to the landfill area itself, there are many other areas within the landfill which emphasize waste reduction and environmental protection.

Yard waste is banned from Florida landfills but is used for daily cover material in the landfill after it’s mulched. Tens of thousands of pounds of mulch is sent to a facility in Auburndale to be converted to Green Energy. The mulch is available FREE to all Brevard County residents, call (321) 633-1888 for more information.

Mulching

Landfill Gas Conversion to Green Energy	The gas produced by the Landfill (methane) is extracted through a vacuum system run by LES (Brevard Energy LLC) which in turn is connected to a power grid at the FP&L Facility (Oleander Plant) and converted to Green Energy.
Anaerobic bacteria break down the garbage in the landfill which produces methane gas. These Flares were burning off the methane to reduce build-up in the landfill. Now that the Landfill Gas Plant is up and running the Flare Station will be utilized only when necessary. :} Seems like we waste energy even when we throw it away. More tomorrow. :}