Republic Services aims to increase beneficial reuse of biogas

July 27, 2020. Republic Services Inc. released an annual sustainability report on July 22 that highlights the company’s renewable energy production and sets a goal to significantly increase the volume of biogas it sends to beneficial reuse by 2030.

According to the report, Republic Services had 75 landfill gas and renewable energy projects in place at its active and closed landfills as of 2019. The report discussed improvements made at one of those existing projects. The company said that in 2019 it replaced an older renewable energy project at its Blue Ridge Landfill in Frenso, Texas, with a system that will generate enough electricity to power more than 4,000 homes annually.

The company is also working to fuel its fleet with renewable natural gas (RNG). “We partner with Clean Energy Fuels to help us manage our 39 compressed natural gas (CNG) stations,” Republic Services said in the report. “In 2019, we initiated three expansion projects to further our commitment to use renewable natural gas as a bridging fuel to lower fleet emissions.” The company added 158 new CNG trucks to its fleet last year, bringing the total number of its vehicles running on alternative fuels to more than 3,200.

In 2019, Republic Services achieved a 4.74 percent year-over-year increase in the beneficial reuse of landfill gas through a targeted effort to identify viable projects. Moving forward, the company has set a goal to increase the volume of biogas sent to beneficial reuse by 50 percent by 2030, when compared to a 2017 baseline.