MSW Contingency Planning: Opportunities for Perham Facility Expansion

The Perham Resource Recovery Facility (PRRF) in Perham, Minnesota receives and processes Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) from Otter Tail, Todd, Wadena and Stearns Counties. Combustion of the MSW provides the generation of steam for sale to two local industries. Under the terms of these steam sales agreements, the PRRF supplies the base load and peak steam required by these industries from a MSW boiler and/or a natural gas-fired auxiliary boiler. The City of Fergus Falls, Minnesota until recently operated the Fergus Falls Waste-to-Energy (WTE) plant. This facility received municipal solid waste (MSW) from Otter Tail and Grant County. The facility generated steam for use in the State Hospital, however, the State of Minnesota has decided to shut down the hospital and will no longer need the steam. As a result, on February 28, 2006, the Fergus Falls plant shut down. HDR Engineering, Inc. (HDR) working with the City of Perham and the participating counties, conducted a study to consider cooperative disposal of the waste currently processed in Fergus Falls. Three of the options considered included expansion of the PRRF. These options included salvaging of portions of the Fergus Falls WTE plant and providing pre-combustion processing of the waste to recover recyclables in order to maximize the Perham plant capacity. This paper describes the options and the conclusions of the investigations.