Natural gas from expanded Roseville sewer plant to help fuel city vehicles

Roseville City Council members voted unanimously Wednesday night to expand the city’s sewer plant and build facilities that recover energy from waste, including natural gas to power city garbage trucks.

“It provides us an opportunity to be innovative with this construction,” said Councilman Scott Alvord, who lives near the treatment plant. “The nice thing about it is that the project will cut down on odor and fuel city vehicles with recovered gas.”

The decision to enlarge the Pleasant Grove Wastewater Treatment Plant, from its current capacity of 9.5 million gallons per day to 12 million gallons per day, is meant to handle urban growth through 2040. The plant is in far west Roseville, a fast-growing area of new homes, shopping centers and office buildings.

The cost will be about $80 million, according to city planners. Government loans and developer fees are expected to cover much of the cost. Construction is anticipated to begin by early next year.

The Energy Recovery Project, to be constructed just south of the existing treatment plant, will heat and compress wastes to produce natural gas and electricity. The natural gas will fuel city vehicles, including trash trucks.

Officials said it would be an unusual arrangement.

“There are couple of government entities that produce compressed natural gas, but they are selling it to entities outside the organization,” said Ken Glotzbach, Roseville’s wastewater utility manager. “We would be the first I know of that will sell the product to entities within the organization in a closed-loop system.”

This story was originally published April 6, 2017 at 5:09 PM with the headline "Natural gas from expanded Roseville sewer plant to help fuel city vehicles."