BMW Manufacturing announced April 20 it has extended its partnership with Ameresco to recycle methane gas from the Palmetto Landfill in Wellford for eight additional years.
As part of the partnership, which began 20 years ago, Ameresco designed and built gas processing and compression facilities as well as a 9.5-mile pipeline from the Palmetto Landfill to BMW’s Spartanburg plant for the methane gas to travel through.
To recycle the landfill’s methane, the BMW project:
- Captures the methane produced at the landfill using dozens of gas extraction wells
- Treats the gas to remove moisture and impurities
- Compresses the gas at the landfill’s Recovery and Compression Station
- Sends the methane through the pipeline to Plant Spartanburg
- Cleans and compresses the gas again at the plant
- Feeds the methane into two efficient gas turbines at the plant’s Energy Center
Once the recycling process is completed, BMW uses the methane gas to generate electricity and heat water throughout its 8 million-square-foot Spartanburg plant.
“For two decades, this project has been a win-win for Upstate South Carolina. It greatly reduces CO2 emissions, resulting in cleaner, healthier air for everyone to breathe,” said Robert Engelhorn, president and CEO of BMW Manufacturing. “Intelligent resource management and the fight against climate change are expressions of our sense of responsibility. The BMW Group will reduce CO2 emissions per vehicle by 40% from 2019 levels by 2030 across the spectrum.”
Since the beginning of the BMW project, more than 9,200 tons of CO2 emissions have been reduced each year, which is the equivalent of eliminating CO2 emissions from vehicles traveling 23.5 million miles every year. BMW Manufacturing expects that the project will reduce CO2 emissions by 74,000 tons over the next eight years.
