Gaston County landfill plant uses methane to generate electricity, county staff say

Staff members at Gaston County’s landfill described a small-scale gas-to-energy operation that captures methane from the landfill and runs three Yenbacher engines to produce electricity sold to the power grid. "We operate Yenbacher engines. They're made in Austria. We have three of them," said Staff member (operations).

County staff said the plant was built to collect landfill methane so it can be either flared or used to generate power; using it in engines lets the county derive financial and environmental benefit rather than simply burning the gas off. "The whole purpose in the beginning is to collect the methane from the landfill and destroy it one way or the other," Staff member (operations) said.

Staff described the gas-collection infrastructure and maintenance that support the plant. The county has roughly 125 extraction wells and completed a wellfield expansion this past summer that added 13 wells "so that we could get increased flow over here and ultimately produce more power," Staff member (engineer) said. The methane is pumped about a mile and a quarter to the engines, and staff emphasized the gas is "really dirty," building deposits on piston heads that must be removed.

Those deposits drive an intensive maintenance schedule: according to staff, the three engines are torn down and cleaned every 3,000 hours to remove buildup described in the transcript as "salanes." Daily work typically begins about 7 a.m. and includes readings, leak and spill checks, parts ordering, and oil sampling to keep the units running and to prepare for larger services.

Staff framed the project as both environmental and fiscal: "It is a renewable fuel. We are making sure that we're not releasing anything bad into the atmosphere," Staff member (operations) said, adding that the plant provides a service to the landfill while "actually paying back to the county." Staff also said that when the three engines run at full load they produce enough power "to power the entire town of Dallas."

Employees were praised for reliability and on-call coverage: staff named Jim and Norm as key on-call technicians available 24 hours for overnight engine failures, and one operator spoke warmly about Norman’s steadying presence.

No formal votes or decisions were recorded in the transcript. The presentation consisted of operational details, recent wellfield expansion, maintenance practices, and staff commentary on the environmental and fiscal benefits of running landfill methane through engines rather than flaring it.