Exelon Waste Management

Exelon Waste Management

Landfill Gas to Energy

Exelon continues to reduce overall greenhouse gas emissions by supporting landfill gas to energy recovery. Utilizing landfill methane to generate electricity produces less environmental impact than burning fossil fuels, and has the added benefit of capturing an energy source that otherwise would have gone to waste. Carbon dioxide (CO2) from landfill methane gas is considered biogenic, or part of the natural carbon cycle. Contrast this with the CO2 from the burning of fossil fuel, which is considered anthropogenic, or arising from human activity. Thus, when the landfill gas displaces fossil fuel, it helps reduce human-caused greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere.

Exelon Power is in the final year of a two-year project to convert an oil-fired plant designed in 1950 into a 21^st Century, clean operating, reliable and efficient generating station through the use of improved technology and production methods. As a result of this project, the two-unit 60 MW Fairless Hills Generating Station will be the second-largest landfill gas generating station in the U.S.; a substantial renewable energy project able to consume 100% of the landfill gas that Waste Management produces at its nearby GROWS and Tulleytown landfills; and a significant contributor to Exelon’s greenhouse gas reduction target through its consumption of landfill gas that would otherwise have been flared.

Exelon Power also operates the 6 MW Pennsbury plant in southeastern Pennsylvania that utilizes landfill gas to generate electric power. Exelon Power was awarded a 1997 Governor's Environmental Excellence Award for its landfill gas projects.

In addition, ComEd purchases electricity generated from landfill methane gas at 21 sites across northern Illinois. To date, Exelon landfill gas initiatives have avoided over 21 million CO2-equivalent tons of emissions.

Coal combustion product reuse

Exelon seeks to minimize the creation of coal ash products and continues its commitment to reuse the byproducts of coal combustion at its fossil generating stations – fly ash, bottom ash, basin ash and flue gas desulfurization products – and prevent them from consuming valuable local landfill capacity.

Exelon achieved an almost 100-percent reuse of coal combustion byproducts from its fossil-generation stations in 2005. This included 100 percent reuse of more than 155,700 tons of ash products. These products were used to stabilize other waste streams and to reclaim retired anthracite coal mine sites. In 2005 virtually all of the approximately 24,500 tons of scrubber byproducts produced were used to stabilize other waste streams and to produce fertilizing agents. These efforts yield multiple benefits by lowering waste disposal costs and conserving valuable landfill space, while reducing air and climate emissions and conserving natural resources. Since 2000, Exelon Power’s reuse of coal combustion byproducts has avoided more than 500,000 tons of CO_2e.

Measuring the value of recycling programs

Exelon expanded its reuse and recycling efforts in 2005 with the launch of Project HERE (Helping the Environment by Recycling at Exelon) across 83 of its facilities. The project encourages its employees to recycle office waste such as paper, cardboard and printer-ink cartridges, as well as containers made of plastic, glass and aluminum. On top of its larger environmental benefits, the initiative is expected to reduce landfill waste disposal costs.

A corporate team that includes members from each Exelon company tracks Project HERE and other recycling programs and identifies opportunities for additional cost savings through waste minimization and new recycling programs. The team’s work led to the establishment of a corporate wide initiative to increase the recycling of municipal waste and reduce generation of hazardous waste, thereby creating additional cost savings.

In addition, in 2005 Exelon's Investment Recovery department—which employs recycling, redeployment, reselling and other productive reuse methods to dispose of surplus, obsolete, scrap or otherwise non-performing assets—recycled 8,500 tons of scrap metal, including more than 2,000 tons of lead. The department also recycled more than 3 million gallons of used transformer oil. In all, these initiatives returned in excess of $10 million to Exelon in 2005. Other efforts included the recycling of 455 tons of paper, 676 tons of untreated wood, and 41 tons of universal waste. Beyond that, Exelon has also donated surplus used office equipment, furniture and computers to civic and community organizations, including school districts.

To view waste management solutions of all BELC members, visit What's Being Done in the Business Community section of this site.