Toledo council delays methane plant decision

1/23/2013

Toledo City Council on Tuesday decided to hold off for two weeks on a Bell administration request for another $1.9 million toward the 2013 operation of the city’s methane “co-generation plant,” which has been idle for six months because of problems with gas delivery from the city’s Hoffman Road Landfill.

The city is in the fourth year of a five-year contract with Solar Turbines Inc. to run and maintain the plant, located at the city’s Bayview Wastewater Treatment Plant. The request includes a fixed annual fee of $1.6 million for operation and maintenance and $300,000 for related services.

The landfill stopped sending methane to the $31 million plant in July and the gas instead has been burned in a flare. City officials said some of the collection system’s pipes may have been crushed in 2010 when dredgings from the Ottawa River were dumped at the landfill.