Capital improvements

Kristin Smith

Over the last several months much has been going on in Washington that if it hasn’t already, should make those involved in solid waste and waste-to-energy industry take notice. I spoke about the first major announcement in the last issue, which was the name change by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of its annual waste generation report to “Advancing Sustainable Materials Management.”

In August, the EPA took another much bolder step when President Barack Obama announced the EPA’s Clean Power Plan, with a goal of reducing carbon emissions to 32 percent below 2005 levels by 2030. The plan is expected to have huge ramifications for the power industry, which accounts for one-third of the country’s carbon emissions.

And there’s more. In September, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack and EPA Deputy Administrator Stan Meiburg announced the United States’ first-ever national food waste reduction goal, calling for a 50 percent reduction by 2030.

Sustainability is clearly part of the federal government’s agenda, and as municipalities, recyclers, waste-to-energy companies and waste generators try to navigate these new initiatives, understanding the processes that will help them meet these goals is more important than ever.

Certainly the Renewable Energy from Waste Conference, Nov. 16-19, 2015, at the Caribe Royale, in Orlando, Florida, will provide some solutions. The conference will give you tools to understand the waste conversion industry and the various ways these technologies can be employed to do exactly what EPA is asking in terms of reducing waste and producing clean, renewable energy sources. Attendees will hear from experts in their fields who are operating systems and have gone through all of the permitting and financing to get there.

Those who help these projects gain public support and obtain permits and financing will also be present. As well, industry suppliers offering the equipment and technology to achieve waste conversion into energy will be participating at the conference. We’ve even put together a half-day workshop, “Planning for Success” that will take you through the steps of making your project a reality.

And if a preconference workshop and two full days of programming isn’t enough, we’ve also granted a limited number of attendees access to the Harvest Power Central Florida Energy Garden to see a waste conversion project fully operating and producing energy.

I hope you will consider attending the REW Conference. More information about the conference is available at www.REWConference.com.