CHARLESTON, W.Va. - Charleston might break new ground locally if entrepreneur Tom Loehr succeeds in building a methane-fueled power plant at the city's landfill, but it will simply be catching up with the rest of the world, as hundreds of "trash-to-electricity" plants already are in operation - some for 20 years or more.

Loehr, accompanied by Mayor Danny Jones, said Monday he is raising $3 million from private investors to build a plant that will capture methane gas from the landfill and convert it into electricity. He plans to sell the electricity, possibly to the University of Charleston, and pay the city a 12.5 percent royalty.

The plant will be the first of its kind in the state, Loehr said, but added, "West Virginia is one of the few states that does not have a landfill methane project."

Indeed, there are about 300 trash-to-gas power plants at municipal landfills in all but six states, said Rachel Goldstein, a program manager with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Landfill Methane Outreach Program.

Nearly one in five of the nation's 2,300 operating or recently closed municipal landfills have some sort of landfill gas project, the EPA says, and it estimates that such projects would be cost-effective at another 535 landfills.

Landfill gas - about half methane, half carbon dioxide - is created when organic wastes decompose in a landfill. Trash creates methane for up to 30 years after it's buried, with peak production at about 15 years, one project manager said.

Right now, Charleston is wasting its methane - an estimated 4,000 tons a year. The gas is either collected and burned (or "flared"), or is simply vented into the atmosphere where it contributes to local smog and global climate change.

Some communities burn methane to make heat or steam; others use it as an alternative fuel for buses or taxis. Most - about 70 percent - use it to generate electricity, as Loehr proposes. He says the 3-megawatt plant he'd build would generate more than enough juice to power the entire UC campus.

Lebanon County, Pa., has been turning trash to power since 1982.

"It was the first project east of the Mississippi," said Mike Pavelek, director of the Greater Lebanon Refuse Authority. The landfill takes in trash from 26 towns in southeastern Pennsylvania, just east of Harrisburg.

The authority, in partnership with energy company PPL, recently opened an educational facility at the landfill that includes a small (1 kilowatt) wind turbine and a 2 KW solar panel. "The reason ... was to demonstrate the relative efficiencies of the different sources of energy.

"The solar panel - if you built a solar panel on your house, you'd never get your money back." A chart of the output from the wind turbine is similarly erratic, he said.

However, the methane plant puts out power day and night, all year long. "Our experience from this has been very good," Pavelek said.

After working for 25 years with Lebanon Methane Recovery, the authority last year signed a contract to sell its methane to PPL. The authority retained its rights to renewable energy credits, he said.

CHARLESTON, W.Va. - Charleston might break new ground locally if entrepreneur Tom Loehr succeeds in building a methane-fueled power plant at the city's landfill, but it will simply be catching up with the rest of the world, as hundreds of "trash-to-electricity" plants already are in operation - some for 20 years or more.

Loehr, accompanied by Mayor Danny Jones, said Monday he is raising $3 million from private investors to build a plant that will capture methane gas from the landfill and convert it into electricity. He plans to sell the electricity, possibly to the University of Charleston, and pay the city a 12.5 percent royalty.

The plant will be the first of its kind in the state, Loehr said, but added, "West Virginia is one of the few states that does not have a landfill methane project."

Indeed, there are about 300 trash-to-gas power plants at municipal landfills in all but six states, said Rachel Goldstein, a program manager with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Landfill Methane Outreach Program.

Nearly one in five of the nation's 2,300 operating or recently closed municipal landfills have some sort of landfill gas project, the EPA says, and it estimates that such projects would be cost-effective at another 535 landfills.

Landfill gas - about half methane, half carbon dioxide - is created when organic wastes decompose in a landfill. Trash creates methane for up to 30 years after it's buried, with peak production at about 15 years, one project manager said.

Right now, Charleston is wasting its methane - an estimated 4,000 tons a year. The gas is either collected and burned (or "flared"), or is simply vented into the atmosphere where it contributes to local smog and global climate change.

Some communities burn methane to make heat or steam; others use it as an alternative fuel for buses or taxis. Most - about 70 percent - use it to generate electricity, as Loehr proposes. He says the 3-megawatt plant he'd build would generate more than enough juice to power the entire UC campus.

Lebanon County, Pa., has been turning trash to power since 1982.

"It was the first project east of the Mississippi," said Mike Pavelek, director of the Greater Lebanon Refuse Authority. The landfill takes in trash from 26 towns in southeastern Pennsylvania, just east of Harrisburg.

The authority, in partnership with energy company PPL, recently opened an educational facility at the landfill that includes a small (1 kilowatt) wind turbine and a 2 KW solar panel. "The reason ... was to demonstrate the relative efficiencies of the different sources of energy.

"The solar panel - if you built a solar panel on your house, you'd never get your money back." A chart of the output from the wind turbine is similarly erratic, he said.

However, the methane plant puts out power day and night, all year long. "Our experience from this has been very good," Pavelek said.

After working for 25 years with Lebanon Methane Recovery, the authority last year signed a contract to sell its methane to PPL. The authority retained its rights to renewable energy credits, he said.

Some states, such as Pennsylvania, have a mandate to produce a certain percentage of their electricity from renewable or "green" sources, such as landfill methane or wind. Green producers get cash when they sell their power, or they can sell their credits to others.

"We used them to build our educational facility," Pavelek said.

West Virginia does not yet have a similar incentive, but the Charleston landfill might still qualify for credits, Goldstein said. "It's certainly possible. There are a number of ways it can work. There are certainly options to explore."

Goldstein's section of the EPA, the Landfill Methane Outreach Program, works on a voluntary basis with landfill operators, developers, communities, states, energy companies and equipment makers to encourage landfill methane projects.

"It was started in 1994 in the climate-change section of the EPA with the goal of methane reduction from landfills," she said. LMOP offers technical support, such as analyzing landfills to predict how much methane they'll produce, for how long (gas curves), and, through a "cost tool," it can analyze the economics of different ways of using the gas.

Loehr called several months ago and Goldstein said she has been offering advice for the Charleston project.

"We generated a gas curve based on data for the landfill," she said. "I have verified the 4,000 tons [per year of methane] estimate."

She couldn't say, however, if the project is economically feasible. "We can't make that decision for them. I don't know what they consider to be a good return on their investment. Each participant has a different view."

At 3 megawatts, the Charleston project is typical, she said. "The average-size electric project is 3 to 4 MW, although we've seen them as small as 1/2 MW and as large as 50 MW."

In a rural area of Pennsylvania near Philadelphia, the Southeast Chester County Refuse Authority last fall opened a 1 MW plant, administrative supervisor Scott Mengle said, with plans to build a second one.

"Our capital costs were a little over $3 million, but we put away money to do this ourselves, so we're getting a bigger bang for our bucks. Our payback on this is about seven years.

"But using a developer is a great way to go," Mengle said. "It's a low-risk way to do it. The developer wouldn't be knocking on the door if they couldn't be making money on it."

Reach Jim Balow at ba...@wvgazette.com or 348-5102.