Senior VP Participates in Heart Walk
October 12, 2011
Richmond, Virginia
Dave Palumbo with his wife and team of nurses responsible for his care.
On Saturday, October 22, Dave Palumbo, INGENCO’s Senior VP of Development, donned a special red cap given to heart disease survivors participating in the annual American Heart Association (AHA) Heart Walk in Richmond, Virginia. Each year participants across the country – survivors, family members, friends, and co-workers – raise funds to support continued research and education efforts to increase awareness and prevent heart disease.
As a survivor of heart disease, Dave understands just how important donations and raising awareness are.
“I became one of the more fortunate persons on Earth when I became the recipient of a successful heart transplant this past May,” Dave says. “Words cannot describe how thankful I have been for the privilege to have been offered so many well wishes by many of you and for the visits while I was awaiting the donor heart. While in the VCU Medical Center awaiting the transplant, I promised to help other heart patients by participating in the AHA Heart Walk. I don’t know how far I can go, but I’ll give it my best.”
Dave was not only able to complete the entire walk, but was also the top fundraiser on his team, raising over twice the amount originally set as his goal. Each member of his team is the recipient of a heart transplant, and together raised almost $2,000. The Heart Walk’s total fundraising goal was $900,000, which they easily surpassed with record donations collected by the 9,000 participants.
Thank you to each and every one that donated and helped Dave far-exceed his fundraising goals. Our ongoing efforts like to support research and raise awareness like the Heart Walk increase the success of the AHA and help millions world-wide suffering from heart disease receive the treatment that enables Dave to continue to be a valuable part of the INGENCO team.
Meeting the Green Energy Demand
July 28, 2011
Richmond, Virginia
There is strong and increasing demand for environmentally responsible power generation in the United States. INGENCO is harnessing the tremendous energy potential of landfill-produced methane gas (LFG), a renewable energy source that is wasted at landfills across the country. INGENCO currently has eleven facilities actively using this renewable energy resource to generate “green” power and has four additional LFG facilities in development.
Incorporating unique technologies such as dual fuel sources and transportation class compression ignition engines, INGENCO engineers have developed a modular approach to building generating capacity. Lower cost, mass produced equipment is used rather than more typical high-cost, specialized systems.
This power plant design incorporates a dual fueling system, allowing the engines to simultaneously burn diesel oil and landfill gas. Each engine is capable of producing 350 kW of electricity at peak rating and drives a 480-volt 3 phase generator. Each group of 6 engines is controlled by a common switchgear unit, which supplies electricity to a step-up transformer. Combining the use of smaller generation sets with our proprietary technology provides each facility with the ability to utilize all of the LFG the landfill produces, maximizing the green energy output.
Our LFG projects, detailed on Facilities, illustrate both our commitment to continued growth in LFG to energy development and our success as a leading LFG to energy provider.
INGENCO’s Construction Revs Up!
March 20, 2011
Richmond, Virginia
Beginning in 2006, INGENCO embarked on an aggressive expansion plan, signing up and building five new landfill gas (LFG). The company added 38 MaxGas MW to their portfolio of generators in the period of a year and a half. Over the following few years the company looked west, focusing a large portion of its resources on the Cedar Hills plant outside of Seattle. With the gas processing plant nearing completion, it is time once again to focus on building more power plants and grow at a rate very similar to the spurt the company experienced back in 2006-2007.
The construction group kicked off the year working to expand two existing sites, New Bern and King & Queen. Operators at the New Bern plant carefully monitor LFG available to the plant and are watching these levels slowly increase beyond the amount that can be burned by the plant’s twelve engines. An additional “six-pack” of engines will be installed in order to provide additional capacity to burn the increasing LFG.
Accommodating this growth calls for nearly doubling the size of the existing building. Because of the strategic planning and foresight of our engineers during the initial construction of this plant, its utility interconnect was designed with room to grow. Tom Hecmanczuk, Director of Construction, and the crew of workers and contractors anticipate completing the installation of and running the extra engines by the end of June.
The King & Queen plant will undergo an even larger expansion, nearly doubling in size with the addition of 24 new engines and increasing the generating capacity to 14 MW. This expansion will make the King and Queen building more than 275 feet long, the largest generating plant in INGENCO history. Unlike New Bern, however, the King and Queen plant will need a larger interconnect. With a seamless permitting process, the interconnect will be completed and ready for the newly-installed engines already online and prepared to generate during the peak summer months.
The company is also in the final stages of signing a project in Wake County, North Carolina. This landfill is strong and growing – a relatively young landfill with a brand new gas collection system. In anticipation of its continued strength, the initial installation will be 6 MW, with planned expansions to 10 MW and potentially up to 14 MW after that. This will be our second facility in North Carolina and is another strength point in our relationship with Progress Energy, the utility to which New Bern sells electricity which will likely contract for this facility’s output as well. The Construction teams are anticipating the completion of this facility by the end of the year.
Henrico Produces Television Segment on INGENCO
October 21, 2010
Richmond, Virginia
From the Garbage to the Grid: A Powerful By-Product of Henrico’s Trash is a 22-minute long segment produced by the Henrico County Public Relations and Media Services department that highlights the partnership between INGENCO and Henrico County at the Springfield Road Landfill. The segment details INGENCO’s process and includes interviews of Alan Petersen, VP of Development, and James Britton, Renewable Power Division Manager.
The segment, after completion of production in mid-2010, first aired in October on Henrico’s Public Access Channel (HCTV). HCTV is carried by most major cable television providers in the area and reaches approximately 100,000 households in the county. The cable networks also reach even more houses in the surrounding counties.
HCTV rotates programming on a regular basis, showing their programming on a schedule. From the Garbage to the Grid is shown one week each airing month on the even hours of Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday. Since its initial debut in October, it has been aired in January and April, playing over 100 times.
Henrico County distributed Garbage to the Grid in DVD format throughout the area. It has also been entered in the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Emmy Awards. HCTV’s segment Electric Garbage: Henrico Set to Convert Landfill, another piece about the Springfield Road Landfill, won an NACIO Meritorious Award for Feature Writing.
INGENCO Participates in Henrico County’s Fifth Annual Energy Symposium
January 9, 2010
Richmond, Virginia
INGENCO participated in Henrico County’s Fifth Annual Energy Symposium, held at Three Lakes Park on October 21 and on the “Plaza” at the western Government Center on October 22, 2009. A joint venture of the County of Henrico and Henrico County Public Schools, the Energy Symposium focused on providing timely information about energy conservation, alternative energy sources and cost-savings.
INGENCO’s presence at the symposium was due in large part to the new landfill gas to energy project being developed at the Springfield Road Landfill. In addition to a table top display, INGENCO brought a generator set to show how the landfill gas to energy plant will be powered.
At Three Lakes Park, sixth grade students from Brookland and Mt. Vernon Middle Schools learned about alternative energy production as well as Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED). Each student was given a series of questions, and each vendor was assigned specific questions to answer. Students learned about what is happening in their community as well as alternative energy. On the second day of the symposium, at the “Plaza,” Henrico County government employees were the audience.
The theme of the symposium, “You Have the Power,” emphasized individuals taking personal responsibility for reducing energy use and costs while focusing on alternative energy sources such as waste-to-energy and solar energy. In addition to INGENCO, twelve other vendors, one Henrico high school science department, and six local government entities participated in the event.
INGENCO to Develop Henrico LFG-to-energy Project
May 1, 2009
Richmond, Virginia
On March 30, Henrico County awarded INGENCO the opportunity to develop a landfill gas-to-energy facility at the Springfield Road landfill, located approximately 10 miles from INGENCO’s Headquarters at Dabney Road. It is expected that the facility will be developed as a 4 MW electric power generating plant.
INGENCO is currently in the process of reaching final agreement on the contract with Henrico County.
INGENCO hosts Landfill Gas Training Session
April 4, 2009
Richmond, Virginia
On March 19, INGENCO hosted a landfill gas training session sponsored by the Old Dominion Chapter of the Solid Waste Association of North America. The event was organized by Steve Yob, PE, Chief of Solid Waste for Henrico County, where INGENCO will soon be developing another generating project.
The seminar, which featured a full day of presentations and discussions on Virginia solid waste regulations and related issues, was intended for executive management, landfill managers, environmental managers, regulatory professionals, engineers and other solid waste professionals.
Among the speakers from INGENCO were Dr. Bob Greene, who talked about air permitting; Alan Petersen, who addressed beneficial use of landfill gas, engine systems, and current energy generation trends, challenges and opportunities; and Dave Palumbo, Senior Vice President of Development, speaking about various methods of power generation.
Attendees also toured INGENCO’s Dabney Road facility and manufacturing plant.