Recipient Organization
YENKIN-MAJESTIC PAINT CORPORATION
1920 LEONARD AVE.
COLUMBUS,OH 43219
Performing Department
(N/A)
Non Technical Summary
Each year Ohio generates enough food waste at homes, restaurants, supermarkets and special events to pile on a football field a half mile high! Although recycling is at a record level, the national food scrap recovery rate is less than three percent and much more can be done to help reduce the amount of food scraps going to landfills. The goal of this Project is to demonstrate the operation of a dry fermentation (anaerobic digestion) system using a mixture of renewable biomass feedstocks comprising pre- and post-consumer food wastes from supermarkets and restaurants; combined with waste grass, leaves, stumps, sawdust, brush and trees; to produce biogas, heat, and power as an offset to natural gas and electricity for the manufacture of industrial coatings and polymers at the Yenkin-Majestic Paint Corporation in Columbus, Ohio. A Project objective is to operate the system at lower cost and with less greenhouse gas emissions than using conventional fuels, thus creating a more sustainable operation. There is an additional Project objective to determine the best way to efficiently collect and transport mixed food wastes to the facility. Anaerobic digestion is a process by which microorganisms break down biodegradable material in the absence of oxygen. As such this technology is considered a renewable energy source because the process produces a biogas suitable for energy production and helps replace fossil fuels. Biomass is fermented to produce biogas, which can be utilized directly in an industrial boiler, fed into a generator set for production of combined heat and power, or compressed into CNG. Each day the Project will collect 100 tons from a network of food and yard waste generators. The total cost of bringing waste to the proposed facility will be lower than alternatives, as the facility will be much closer to the source of waste generators and have lower disposal fees than a distant landfill. Once the material is received, it will be loaded into one of eight airtight "garage" type buildings where is will sit for 28 days. Liquid will be percolated into the stored biomass, collected at the bottom, and re-circulated through the pile as the digester ferments; and the biogas will be collected and moved to the downstream processes for cleaning and conversion to energy. After fermentation, the material will be cured in a building for an additional few weeks after which it can be used as high-grade compost. The gas, heat, and electricity produced from the Project will be consumed "off-grid" by Yenkin-Majestic Paint Corporation for purposes of supplying their energy needs, and also reducing greenhouse gasses, in their polymer and coatings production. This Project will demonstrate an off-grid, distributed combined heat and power system operated on renewable waste biomass and with low needs for additional resources such as city utilities, notably water and waste water. Thus, this system lends itself well to establishment in rural areas, particularly on farms or isolated manufacturing plants. The co-location of anaerobic digestion technology with an industrial manufacturing facility, whether liquid or dry fermentation, is novel.
Animal Health Component
(N/A)
Research Effort Categories
Basic
(N/A)
Applied
(N/A)
Developmental
100%
Goals / Objectives
One objective is to demonstrate at scale the operation of a dry fermentation system operating principally (60 percent) on a renewable biomass feedstock of pre and post-consumer food wastes from supermarkets and restaurants and the remaining (40 percent) from renewable cellulosic waste sawdust, grass, leaves, stumps, brush and trees and other forms of wood wastes. The Project will produce biogas, heat, CNG, and electric power as an offset to non-renewable natural gas and electricity for the manufacture of coatings and polymers, and also produce compost as an agricultural co-product. Another objective is to operate the system at a net lower cost and with fewer greenhouse gas emissions (methane), and thus create a more sustainable operation than using conventional fossil fuels, as well as diverting substantial wastes from landfills. The role of Yenkin-Majestic as a consumer of the bioproducts on this project is to demonstrate a distributed "stand-alone" system producing significant energy necessary to operate a large industrial facility. Upon successful demonstration, this project can be mirrored in a rural application, at a large farm, food processing plant, or other rural-based manufacturing plants.
Project Methods
For some time now, as a nation we have been expending substantial resources on the growing of biomass for energy in competition with food and fiber crops. A different approach is to start with the conversion of biomass residuals and wastes that involve disposal or treatment costs and have already been collected or concentrated in a central location. The organic portion of material thrown into landfills ranges from 60 to 75 percent, of which food waste makes up between 15 and 20 percent. The scarcity of licensed facilities, costs of transportation, and internal handling costs make the food waste diversion economically challenging; and from the small amount of material in the state of Ohio that does go to a compost facility, there is no energy recovery. This Project will demonstrate that this same material with no significant preparation can be delivered to the Project for conversion to biogas, electricity and bioproducts. The BEKON dry fermentation technology uses anaerobic digestion followed by composting, a process that yields a biogas containing 55% methane, which may be combusted onsite to produce electricity, or purified to pipeline gas quality. Although anaerobic digestion for production of biogas is quite common in North America, all such existing processes employ wet feedstock (maximum solids of 8%). By contrast, the BEKON process utilizes the relatively dry organic portion of the MSW stream, with maximum solids of up to 50%. Biomass is introduced to the fermentation chambers in batches. A pile of biomass is fed into a fermentation chamber and left alone for about 28 days, during which time the biomass conversion runs automatically through the biological fermentation phases, based on a balanced mix of required substrates and bacteria. The residual biomass can be used for composting purposes. The Project's dry fermentation units can be fed with a variety of different biomass components, composed of seasonally and constantly available raw materials. It is important to define and maintain a sustained mix and quality of raw material in order to ensure efficient biogas production. This requires some knowledge specific to the dry fermentation process, as well as constant monitoring and control of the operations of the plant. The targeted waste generators that can produce the required materials include grocery stores, restaurants, commissaries, caterers, sports venues, food processing plants, schools, hospitals and farms. The Project will be implemented in three phases over three years. Phase 1 will involve engineering, permitting, bidding, and contract negotiations. Phase 2 will involve site preparation, construction, equipment installation, start-up, and operational debugging. Phase 3 will involve the procurement and processing of biomass feedstock; the continuous-batch fermentation into biogas; the conversion of biogas into burner-tip ready biogas, compressed natural gas (CNG), and "green" electricity; the conversion of the residual mass into usable agricultural compost; the sale of such products at commercially-competitive prices; and the operation of the process at break-even or better in a safe and reliable manner.