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Milliken Expands Methane Harvest Program

The initiative has the annual equivalent to removing the pollution emissions of 10,000 vehicles.

by Mairi Beautyman

Interior Design · April 24, 2008

Milliken & Company continues to draw alternative energy from an unlikely source: landfills. Approved this week, just in time for Earth Day (April 22), the textile and chemical manufacturer has entered into its second methane harvesting initiative. 

Tapped from a landfill in Spartanburg County, the methane will travel through a gas pipeline to Milliken's Dewey plant near Inman, South Carolina. The deal is financially beneficial to both parties -- Milliken will purchase the gas and Spartanburg County will oversee the construction and operation of an enhanced methane extraction system at the Wellford Landfill and the pipeline.

Methane, a naturally occurring landfill bi-product, has serious environmental consequences. The Spartanburg County project, says Milliken, has the annual equivalent to removing the pollution emissions of 10,000 vehicles, planting 14,000 acres of forest, offsetting the use of 260 railroad cars of coal, offsetting the use of 125,000 barrels of oil, eliminating 52,000 tons of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide, and removing pollution emissions from electricity generation for usage in 5000 homes.
 
"With the success of our methane program in LaGrange, Georgia, Spartanburg County immediately realized the benefit of this proposal to the local government, our community, Milliken, and ultimately the Earth," says Richard Dillard, director of public affairs for Milliken.

Above: The LaGrange Landfill Methane Facility. Image courtesy of Milliken & Company.

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