A Pennsylvania-based company wants to solve a disposal problem by using chicken manure to fuel electricity plants. A report in the Wall Street Journal said Fibrowatt LLC, a subsidiary of U.K.-based Homeland Renewable Energy, has plans to build these plants in poultry-rich Georgia, Arkansas and North Carolina.
In 2007, Fibrowatt erected the first litter-fueled energy plant in the U.S. in Minnesota, the country’s largest turkey-producing state. It burns 500,000 tons of turkey litter each year creating steam to turn turbines in a 55-megawatt power plant that provides electricity for some 40,000 homes. But critics worry that these will emit high levels of pollutants including nitrogen oxide, carbon monoxide and particulates, even with the use of pollution-control measures.
