Having required an investment of $58 million, the first power plant fueled by methane gas in Central America has begun operations.
The plant, which uses gases from the Mides landfill as its main raw material, has an initial average generation capacity of 6MW.
"The landfill handles more than six million tons of solid waste, and the AES plant has installed 3000 meters of piping to extract the gases from garbage,” reads an article on Elmundo.com.sv.
Implemented by company "Industrias de Biogás", the project will potentially generate 4 Megawatts.
Developed at a landfill in Zone 3 of Guatemala City, 120 wells will extract Methane from the landfill in order to produce the electricity.
"The landfill in Zone 3 receives about two thousand tons of garbage a day, and what is expected is for this project to produce an average of 70 thousand tons of carbon dioxide per year during the period 2012-2016,” reported Prensalibre.com.
AES will develop the country’s first methane gas power plant.
Works are scheduled to begin on July 7, starting operations on early 2011.
Luis Pérez, manager of the project AES Nejapa, told Elsalvador.com that “this is a modest plant, which will initially generate 6MW, but has enough technical capacity to eventually output 24MW”.
AES expects to increase the plant’s production in two MW every two or three years, depending on how much solid waste is accumulated in the landfill.