September 30, 2005—The city of Millbrae, in California, has partnered with Chevron Energy Solutions to build facilities at Millbrae’s Water Pollution Control Plant (WPCP) that will generate on-site electricity from restaurant kitchen grease and other organic matter.
The upgrades to the WPCP will make it one of the first wastewater treatment plants in the US to receive and process inedible grease in a comprehensive system specifically designed to control odors, generate reliable power, reduce energy costs and provide a new municipal revenue stream, says Chevron.
The new system will use a free biofuel—in this case, adigester gas produced from grease—that is expected to increase the amount of green power now generated by the facility’s cogeneration plant by 40 percent. Because the system will generate electricity on-site, the city will avoid having to purchase about 1.5 million kilowatt-hours from the local utility each year. This lower demand translates to 1,178,000 fewer pounds of carbon dioxide emissions annually, equivalent to planting 166 acres of trees, Chevron says.
The new system is a culmination of nine months of collaborative planning by the city of Millbrae and Chevron ES, which is engineering and managing the installation as prime contractor. For more information, visit the Chevron ES Web site.
