Inside the Energy Transition: A Conversation with Our Director of Energy
Natalie Mason, Director of Energy
1. How does renewable natural gas contribute to reducing harmful emissions and supporting cleaner energy systems?
Renewable natural gas is derived from methane gas that is captured through the anaerobic digestion process. Since it is captured rather than emitted into our atmosphere, this is a step toward emissions reduction. This is why it is so important for states to follow California’s LCFS protocol, which will incentivize companies like ours to build more digesters to divert food waste from landfills, where emissions are currently vented or burned. Our footprint is significantly smaller than that of a landfill, and the energy used to produce RNG is lower than that of fossil fuels, ethanol, and renewable diesel.
2. Why is food waste such an important issue for energy and sustainability, and what happens when it is processed through anaerobic digestion?
It is an important issue because if there were no anaerobic digesters, waste would continue to be sent to landfills, where it would slowly break down over decades in the ground and emit toxic methane gas. Landfills use an enormous natural resource, land, to dispose of our waste, and if we can divert that waste to a digester, where a digester can recreate that natural environment to break down the food and capture that methane to be used to create fuel for our huge transportation industry, then it reduces our emissions significantly.
3. What emerging trends in energy or organics recycling are you most excited to see gaining traction?
State policies that encourage residents to separate their organics from non-organic waste and send them to companies like ours or composting facilities to reduce methane emissions and the cost of disposal. In addition, State policy is incentivizing CNG/LNG fleet vehicles over electric. RNG is the only industry that derives its fuel from true waste streams and uses less energy to convert it into a gas commodity identical to a fossil fuel commodity. There are no blend limits with RNG, and it can be injected directly into a pipeline.
4. How do facilities MBC and MORC help communities strengthen their energy reliability and reduce waste?
One way we strengthen it is by providing a heating source that does not rely on putting our natural resources at risk to access or retrieve them. In addition, we bring temporary and permanent jobs to any community we build in. We provide a solution for commercial customers to reduce their disposal costs and reduce methane emissions.
5. What is one misconception about renewable natural gas or food waste diversion that you wish more people understood?
One misconception is that renewable natural gas costs more to buy. The physical molecules of RNG are priced the same way as fossil fuel natural gas. However, the renewable credits, which are a result of a mandate policy by our federal government, are sold separately and will not increase residential customers’ utility bills.