Milestones: 1990-2005

Introduction:
The I-95 Energy Resource Recovery Facility in Fairfax County is privately owned and operated by Covanta Fairfax, Inc., a subsidiary of Covanta Energy. The current service agreement with Covanta expires in February 2011. The Fairfax County Division of Solid Waste Disposal and Resource Recovery oversees operation of the facility and is responsible for providing 930,750 tons of waste each year to the facility.

Under contract to Fairfax County, the facility is located adjacent to the I-95 Landfill Complex. The Energy Resource Recovery Facility is one of the largest waste-to-energy facilities in the country. Construction of the facility began in 1987 and operation began in June of 1990.

Municipal solid waste serves as the fuel for the facility. Steam is produced that turns turbines that generate about 80mW of electricity.

The facility processes not only municipal solid waste but also such waste items as confidential documents, infested nursery plant materials, old currency and other items that need assured destruction.

The facility is heavily permitted and required to report any exceedances of its permits to the issuing authority or Virginia Department of Environmental Quality.

Oversight:
The Fairfax County Division of Solid Waste Disposal and Resource Recovery oversees operation of the I-95 Energy Resource Recovery Facility. The county has a 20-year operating agreement with the owner of the facility, Covanta Fairfax, Inc. Under the agreement, the county monitors the operations of the facility and is responsible for providing 930,750 tons of waste to the facility annually. The agreement with Covanta Fairfax, Inc. ends in early 2011.

Facts and Statistics:
Occupies 23 acres at the I-95 Landfill Complex.

Operates four 750 ton-per-day waterwall furnaces with a capacity to burn 3,000 tons per day of solid waste at a heating value of 5,500 BTU.

Burns at a temperature of 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit.

Processes about one million tons of waste annually. The Guaranteed Annual Tonnage (GAT) requirement is 930,750 tons.

Reduces waste by 90% in volume leaving an ash product that is landfilled.

Reduces waste by 74% in weight during processing.

In FY2006, the E/RRF:

• processed 1,050,066 tons of waste (the equivalent of using about 2 million barrels of fuel oil)
• produced enough electricity to power 75,000 homes
• Disposed of 263,710 tons of ash in the I-95 ash monofill
• Reduced production of Green House Gases

Steam generators produce 80 megawatts of electricity.

The facility uses 8 megawatts of energy for its operations. Seventy-two megawatts are sold to Dominion Virginia Power (enough electricity to power 75,000 homes).

The facility burns waste from Fairfax County, the District of Columbia, and portions of waste from other local jurisdictions.

Ferrous and non-ferrous metals are recovered after the combustion process, providing for the ultimate recycling of waste.

Electricity Production:
The Energy Resource Recovery Facility produces 80 megawatts of electricity.

• 8 megawatts of energy for the facitlity's internal operations
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• 72 megawatts are sold to Dominion Virginia Power (enough electricity to power 75,000 homes).

By producing electricity using solid waste, we save the cost and emissions of using either natural gas or coal to produce the electricity.

About 2 million barrels of oil would be needed to replace the solid waste fuel processed in FY2006.

How Is Waste Processed:
The following is a diagram of the energy recovery process, highlighting the emissions control system.

1. Combustion controls reduce carbon monoxide (CO), dioxins and hydrocarbons
2. Ammonia is injected to control nitrogen oxides (NOx)
3. Semi-dry scrubbers inject lime to control acid gases
4. Carbon is introduced to control mercury
5. Fabric filter baghouses control particulate matter and metals
6. Continuous emissions monitoring (CEM) system continually checks emissions and alerts if there are exceedances

Solid waste enters the facility from collection vehicles that dump their waste on the tip floor. The waste is picked up by huge cranes and deposited in the 4 chutes and onto the reciprocating grates that move the waste into the combustors. The waste is tumbled and burned as fuel, heating the boilers where steam is produced. The steam travels through pipes to the turbines that generate the electricity.

Ash, gas and other products of burning continue through the facility where reagents such as lime, ammonia and carbon are introduced to remove metals and clean the gases. The gases pass through the baghouses (a collection of huge fabric filters) where particulate matter is filtered. The cleaned gases are emitted through the stack. The ash is cooled then deposited on conveyors where it is transported to the ash building to await further processing that removes ferrous and nonferrous metals, prior to being moved to the ash landfill.

The steam is cooled and the resulting water is collected in the blowdown towers, where it is treated prior to being reused or sent to the sewer system.

In January 2004, a new ash conditioning system was added to the energy facility system to maintain the pH at between 8.5 and 10.5. Dolomitic lime is mixed with fly and bottom ash while it is cooling.  This ash additive ensures that metals are chemically bound within the ash and will not leach out or contaminate once the ash is landfilled.

Pollution Control:
The energy facility is equipped with several pollution control technologies that keep the facility in compliance with the Clean Air Act:

• Special burn technologies that assure complete processing
• Semidry acid gas scrubbers to remove acid gases
• Baghouses (large filters like in a vacuum cleaner) that remove particulate matter from stack gases
• Lime, ammonia, and carbon that combine with metals, remove the metals from air emissions, and bind them into inert ash

In order to meet the criteria for the Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) permit issued by the Commonwealth of Virginia, the boilers themselves are designed for pollution control. USEPA

Key stack emissions are continuously monitored for permit compliance.

The gas emissions from the stack are tested annually to determine that all emissions are within permit limits. The ash produced during the combustion process is tested periodically for metals content, pH and other factors. The cooled water from the steam process is treated before it is discharged into the sewer system.

This table shows the reduction in air emissions for waste-to-energy plants throughout the country from 1990 to 2000.

Pollutant	1990 Emissions	2000 Emissions	Percent Reduction
CCD/CDR, total mass basis*	218,000 g/yr	679 g/yr	99+
CCD/CDF, TEQ basis**	4,260 g/yr	12.0 g/yr	99+
Mercury	45.2 tons/yr	2.20 tons/yr	95.1
Cadmium	4.75 tons/yr	0.333 tons/yr	93.0
Lead	52.1 tons/yr	4.76 tons/yr	90.9
Particulate Matter	6,930 tons/yr	707 tons/yr	89.8
Hydrogen Chloride (HCL)	46,900 tons/yr	2,672 tons/yr	94.3
Sulfur Dioxide (SO2)	30,700 tons/yr	4,076 tons/yr	86.7
Nitrogen Oxides (NOx)	56,400 tons/yr	46,500 tons/yr	17.6

Source: EPA Office of Air Quality Planning and Standards, 2002
*CCD/CDF Chlorinated dibenzo-p-dioxins/chlorinated dibenzo-p-furans
**Dioxin/furan emissions in units of toxic equivalent quality (TEQ) using 1989 NATO toxicity factors

"The results indicate that the MSW (municipal solid waste) management actions taken by U.S. communities have significantly reduced potential GHG (green house gases) emissions despite an almost 2-fold increase in waste generation. GHG emissions from MSW management were estimated to be 36 million metric tons carbon equivalents (MMTCE) in 1974 and 8 MMTCE in 1997. If MSW were being managed today as it was in 1974, GHG emissions would be about 60 MMTCE."  Source: Journal of the Air & Waste Management Association, September 2002

The ash is non-hazardous and is disposed in the ash monofill of the I-95 Landfill Complex.  Source: O'Brien and Gere Laboratories, Inc. analysis of test results of ash from the Energy Resource Recovery Facility collected June 1-10, 2006.

Pollutant	Permit Limit	Average E/RRF Emissions Result
Sulfur Dioxide (SO2)	29 ppm	9.5 ppm
Carbon Monoxide (CO)	100 ppm	5.25 ppm
Nitrous Oxides (NOx)	205 ppm	192.25 ppm
Hydrochloric Acid (HCL)	29 ppm	8.4875 ppm
Particulate Matter (PM)	27 mg/dscm	6.68 mg/dscm
Dioxin/Furans	30 ng/Nm3	0.0123 ng/Nm3
Mercury (Hg)	0.080 mg/dscm	0.0046175 mg/dscm

ppm = parts per million  mg = milligram  ng = nanogram  DScm = dry standard cubic meter

Covanta Fairfax, Inc. Annual compliance Stack & RATA Test Reports, (COV) Report No. 3138), 12-15.

 

Overall Emissions Reductions from Energy Resource Recovery Facility resulting from the Clean Air Act retrofit in 2000:

• 98.3% Removal of Sulfur dioxide
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• 95.5% Removal of Hydrochloric Acid
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• 98.6% Removal of Mercury
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• 45% Reduction in Nitrogen Oxides

Fairfax County Waste Processed:
Most of the solid waste processed in the Energy Resource Recovery Facility is generated in Fairfax County. In FY2006, for the first time in the history of the facility, Fairfax County residents generated more than the Guaranteed Annual Tonnage (930,750 tons).

 

Fiscal Year	Tons
2000	676,418
2001	724,043
2002	776,757
2003	819,681
2004	884,080
2005	927,570
2006	960,499

The table above shows the total amount of Fairfax County-only waste processed in the facility from FY2000 through FY2006 (Fiscal Year is July -June). The Guaranteed Annual Tonnage (GAT) amount each year is 930,730 tons.

The Energy Resource Recovery Facility accepts limited amounts of waste from the District of Columbia, Arlington and Prince William Counties, and cities/towns of Falls Church, Vienna, Fairfax City, Herndon, and Reston. Some spot market waste is processed periodically.

In the future, additional recycling materials will need to be removed from the waste stream to allow the energy facility to maintain its capacity to process materials that cannot be recycled.

Solid Waste Management Plan Strategies
Following the development of the Solid Waste Management Plan, a 20-year plan for how the county systems will collect, transport, manage, dispose and recycle all the waste generated in the county, the Board of Supervisors approved a strategy to continue using the energy facility following the end of the current Service Agreement in 2011.

For details about the operation of the Energy Resource and Recovery Facility and strategies for its future through 2024, refer to:
Solid Waste Management Plan, Chp. 6, pages 2-6 (PDF) and Solid Waste Management Plan, Chp. 12, beginning on page 12 (PDF).