Duke Energy ties pig poop gas to lines for power plants
Duke Energy Corp. is finally converting methane gas from North Carolina's plentiful hog operations into gas that could be burned at electric power plants.
Posted — UpdatedThe country's second largest electric company said Tuesday that, for the first time, it is piping purified methane from industrial-scale hog farms into natural gas lines that supply power plants.
The Optima KV operation in Duplin County serves as a mini-refinery, capturing gas from decaying hog waste in covered lagoons at five nearby Smithfield Foods farms. The operation then purifies the methane before pumping it into a Piedmont Natural Gas pipeline.
The milestone comes more than a decade after North Carolina legislators directed the company to start using animal waste to generate a fraction of the electricity it sells. The directive was part of the Renewable Energy Portfolio Standard adopted in 2007 that required utilities to get a small but increasing percentage of their energy from renewable sources.
The hog waste gas will be used by a Richmond County gas-fired plant to power about 1,000 homes.
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