Elk River resource recovery project to close

Great River Energy, Maple Grove, Minnesota, is closing its resource recovery project in Elk River, Minnesota that converts trash into energy after failing to find a willing buyer for it, reports MPR News. The facility includes a plant where solid waste is processed into fuel, a power plant that burns the fuel to generate energy and a landfill for leftover ash.

Great River Energy has owned the power plant since 1989 and bought the processing plant and landfill in 2010. It employs 84 people, MPR says.

The plant has been financially unsustainable for years because of low electricity prices and less garbage coming in, the Great River spokesperson said. It operated at 80 percent capacity in 2016, according to a previous article in the Star Tribune, and lost millions of dollars per year. Half of the metro area’s waste is recycled or composted while 23 percent of it went to landfills in 2015 and 28 percent was processed for waste-to-energy (WTE).

Great River announced in July that it would sell the plant unless a buyer stepped forward. Officials reached out to several counties about partnering to purchase the plant, but none agreed, MPR reports.