| |JULY 20248IN MY OPINIONTHE POWER OF WASTE ­ MAXIMIZING ITS POTENTIAL THROUGH INNOVATIVE FUEL CELL TECHNOLOGYBy Ivor Castelino, Head, Waste to Energy, Bloom EnergyHumans generate an incredible amount of waste - nearly 2 billion metric tons a year - and that number is expected to grow by 70 percent by 2050. To make matters worse, two-thirds of human-generated methane emissions come from waste. Methane is a potent greenhouse gas, with 25 times more warming potential than carbon dioxide. Dealing with our waste effectively is critical for the long-term survival of humanity.Fortunately, technologies exist to deal with this problem. Anaerobic digesters that convert organic waste into biogas and renewable fertilizer in a controlled manner have been proven for a long time. However, biogas has historically been flared at waste sites (converted to carbon dioxide without getting any productive use) or combusted in a combustion generator to produce electricity. While both methods do destroy methane, they cause significant local air pollution in the form of NOx, SOx, and particulate matter emissions.More recently, mainly through significant policy enablers in the US and Europe, larger biogas projects have been upgrading biogas to pipeline-quality natural gas (called Renewable Natural Gas or RNG) that is either injected into the gas distribution system or trucked to its end-use location. These projects displace fossil
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