Philadelphia Water Department’S Renewable Biofuels Facility Combines Biogas-To-Energy and Biosolids-To-Energy Utilizing a Public Private Partnership

As green energy management opportunities are more aggressively pursued within the wastewater treatment process, there are numerous interconnected technical and organizational systems involved; including balancing program objectives and priorities, procurement, technology selection, design, finance, permitting, construction, start-up, operations, maintenance, product manufacturing and marketing to diversified customers. This also requires the recognition of legacy facilities reflecting goals and technologies of the past, a comprehensively broad-based analysis of current technologies and policy objectives, and an effort to peer into the future to predict how today’s decisions affect future options.More than a decade in the works, on May 9, 2014, Philadelphia Water Department held a grand opening for its new Philadelphia Renewable Bio-Fuels Facility. Utilizing biogas from anaerobic digestion to fuel a newly constructed biosolids dryer facility that manufactures a renewable biofuel allowed the project delivery team to advance industry understanding on implementing green energy objectives.