The Hamilton Spectator - www.thespec.com/
17 Oct 2008

The city has nabbed an award for its cogeneration facility at the Woodward Avenue Water and Wastewater Treatment Plant.

The P.J. Marshall Plaque Award the city won is given for environmental leadership and innovation on an annual basis by the Association of Municipalities of Ontario (AMO).

This is the second award this year honouring Hamilton Renewable Power Incorporated, which is owned by the city of Hamilton. The facility is one of the largest-scale examples of biogas cogeneration in the country. It uses methane gas created by the wastewater treatment process to produce electricity and heat to power the wastewater facility.

The cogeneration facility opened in September 2006 and will result in a reduction of about 130,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas emission over 20 years of the project. It converts 32 per cent of the available energy in the gas to electricity and 48 per cent to heat that is then used to operate the Woodward plant. The heat that is harvested from the engine saves natural gas costs.