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November 13

, 20 13

Via Electronic Transmission: a
- and

- r
- docket @epa.gov
Docket ID No. EPA

- HQ

- OAR

- 20 12

- 0 4 01

M r. Joseph Sopata
Office of Transportation and Air Quality U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (6 4 0 6

- J) 1200 Pennsylvania Ave., NW Washington, DC 20460

Re: Waste Management Comments R egarding Docket ID No. EPA

- HQ

- OAR

- 2012

- 0 401

Dear M r

. Sopata:

Waste Management (“WM”) is pleased to offer the following supplemental comments on the United States Environmental Protection Agency’s (“EPA’s” or “Age ncy’s”) Proposed Regulation of Fuels and Fuel Additives: RFS Pathways II and Technical Amendments to the RFS2 Standards (hereinafter referred to as the “ RFS2 Amendments ” ) 7 8 Fed. Reg. 36

, 0 4 2 ( June 14 , 20 13 ). Our supplemental comments respond to a number of issues and claims made in joint comments by the Friends of the Earth, Sierra Club and the Center for a Competitive Waste Industry.

WM is the leading provider of comprehensive waste and environmental services in North America. We are also a leading producer of renewable, waste

- based energy

– enough to power nearly 1. 2 million homes each year. Headquartered in Houston, WM operates in 48 states in the U.S. and most Canadian provinces. Our network of operations in cludes 3 90 collection operations, 3 52 waste transfer stations, 1 25 recycling facilities for differing commodities

, 36 organic composting and processing facilities, 2 66 active landfill disposal sites, 1 3 8 landfill gas

to

- energy projects

, 17 waste

- to

- energy (WTE) plants, and five independent power production plants (operations as of January 2012 )

. WM is also exploring innovative technologies to make
renewable fuels from waste. For example, i n 2008 WM formed a joint venture with Linde
North America to build the world’s largest facility to convert landfill gas into clean vehicle fuel

. The plant is producing enough ultra

- low

- carbon fuel to power 300 of our heavy

- duty collection
trucks.

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“Landfill biogas

- to

- energy projects are harmful to the environment and create a perverse incentive to generate more waste and pollution.”

WM Response :

In response to the comment that landfill gas

- to

- energy (LFGTE) projects harm the environment

-- nothing could be further from the truth. EPA, state and local governments and communities support and promote LFGTE projects as sources of abundant, clean energy. EPA’s Office of Atmospheric Programs established the Landfill Methane Outreach Program (LMOP) to promote LFGTE projects and market the benefits of project development to communities. “ EPA launched LMOP to encourage productive use of this resource (landfill gas (LFG) as part of the United States' commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. ” (See LMOP Webs ite http://www.epa.gov/lmop/basic

- info/index.html#a04 )

The EPA website describes beneficial use of LFG as a fuel that allows communities to prevent methane from escaping to the air by capturing and using LFG as a local energy source. EPA estimates “that a LFG TE project will capture roughly 60 to 90 percent of the methane emitted from the landfill, depending on system design and effectiveness. The captured methane is destroyed (converted to water and the much less potent CO 2 ) when the gas is burned to produce electricity. This serves to reduce significantly greenhouse gas emissions. EPA further
describes additional environmental benefits on its website

-- “Producing energy from LFG
avoids the need to use non

– renewable resources such as coal, oil, or natural gas to produce the same amount of energy. This can avoid p ower plant emissions of CO 2 and criteria pollutants such as sulfur dioxide (wh ich is a major contributor to acid rain), particulate matter (a respiratory health concern), nitrogen oxides (NO X ), and trace hazardous air pollutants.” (ibid.)

EPA developed a brochure for communities evaluating LFGTE projects and noted the types of
ben efits communities can derive from such projects:

■ Fuel cost savings

■ Reduced operating expenses

■ Job creation related to project s

■ Improved economic development near the landfill

■ Enhanced image as an innovative community

■ A safer landfill with red uced potential for odors

■ Improved local air quality

■ Reduced greenhouse gas emissions

■ A reliable local fuel source

■ Less need for polluting fossil fuels

See http://www.epa.gov/lmop/documents/pdfs/new_community_brochure.pdf

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A financial incentive for landfill gas in the RFS program is in direct contrast to the goal to reduce, reuse and recycle waste.

WM Response :

Contrary to the commenters’ claim, a financial incentive to further the use LFG as a feedstock for transportation fuel is wholly consistent with federal renewable energy goals, and will help to increase significantly the production of cellulosic ethanol and diesel fuels. Over the last decades, the US Congress, EPA and more than half of the States have promoted beneficial landfill gas projects by offering financial incentives, regulatory flexibility and partnership and assistance programs. Encouraging new LFGTE projects is a fundamental component of b oth the Office of Atmospheric Programs’ climate change, mitigation initiatives, and the Office of Solid Waste and Emergency Response’s Materials Management 2020 Initiative.

While the commenters contend that this policy will lead to generation of greater volumes of solid waste and lower recycling rates, they offer no data to support that conclusion. The Agency’s analyses; however, refute this claim. The EPA’s most recent report, Management of Municipal Solid Waste: 2011 Facts and Figures

, (EPA

- 530

- R

- 13

- 001, May 2013), shows that incentives for LFG beneficial use projects work in concert with reducing waste generation and increasing recycling rates. Since 2000 through 2011, the amount of MSW generated has declined by about three percent, w hile the amount of MSW recovered for recycling has grown by nearly 20 percent. Waste Management alone has steadily grown the amount of materials we recycle from 8.5 million tons in 2009 to nearly 14 million tons in 2012. O ne of o ur

company 2020 sustainability goal s is to double (from 2007) the amount of material we recycle
to 20 million tons. We a re well on the way towards meeting that go al.

The base line for the life

- cycle analysis cannot be a landfill with active gas collection and a flare. The energy must be produced from long closed landfills for only in the distant past was it the norm for yard trimmings to be landfilled. The baseline should be composting and digestion of yard trimmings and food scraps

WM strongly disagrees with this comment for several reasons. “Long closed” landfills tend to be small and inappropriate for development of renewable fuel projects because the amount and quality of gas produced by the landfill is declining. In fact, it is unlikely that an older, closed landfill would have sufficient gas flows to support a gas collection system and the capital expenditure necessary to install the gas treatment equipment or connect the facility to an interstate pipeline. Typical r enewable natural gas from landfill projects cost in the range of $15

- $25 million to install, and so require long

- term prospects for a sufficient amount and quality of LFG production to meet return on investment goals of project investors. While the

commen ters did not specify what they viewed as “long closed,” EPA recognizes in its New Source Performance Standards for MSW Landfills that closed landfills experience significantly declining gas volumes within 15 years of closure.

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Commenters further contend th at the baseline for the Agency’s life

- cycle analysis should be composting or anaerobic digestion because it is no longer the norm for separated food and yard wastes to be landfilled. While the commenters provide the number of states that have instituted p olicies to divert yard wastes from landfills, they offer no supporting data on amount of food or yard wastes managed via composting or anaerobic digestion. EPA does maintain such statistics, and in the report referenced above (EPA

- 530

- R

- 13

- 001, May 2013), noted that approximately eight percent (8%) of MSW is recovered and composted. Since 2000, that recovery rate has grown less than 2% from a rate of 6.5%, despite the implementation of state yard waste diversion policies. The EPA does not keep statistics on the amount of MSW components that are managed in anaerobic digesters, but it is significantly smaller than the amount composted. Given these statistics, EPA was clearly justified in selecting MSW landfilling with gas collection and flaring as the base line for its life

- cycle analysis of GHG reductions associated with use of LFG as a transportation fuel. The vast majority of MSW landfilled today is in large landfills subject to the EPA NSPS for Landfills, and that operate landfill gas collection and con trol systems.

An increasing percentage of landfills with LFG collection and control systems are operating beneficial LFG projects rather than simply flaring the gas. WM has 13 8 such projects at about half of our landfills. Not all landfills can support such projects because of difficulties in connecting to the electricity grid directly or because an end user is not located near the landfill to economically make use of the LFG as a fuel. EPA’s proposal to make LFG a cellulosic fuel feedstock will provide much needed impetus to develop additional beneficial use projects that produce renewable transportation fuel. Because many LFG to electricity projects are facing economic difficulties due to lower electricity rates, the number of new projects has dwindle d.

The opportunity to use LFG to produce renewable cellulosic transportation fuel will once more provide the economic incentive to develop new projects. The Coalition for Renewable Natural Gas members estimate that they will produce and distribute betwe en 114

- 141 million ethanol equivalent gallons of landfill gas derived transportation fuel in 2014. This fuel will come from existing high BTU gas projects that are now upgrading and piping gas to utilities for electricity production and will begin to upgr ade and pipe the LFG as transportation fuel to end users instead. Additionally, WM now produces about 5 million ethanol equivalent gallons of fuel from its Altamont renewable LNG project. We plan to commission a new project in third quarter of 2014 that will begin producing about a million gallons of RNG in late 2014, and beginning in 2015 will create about 10 million ethanol equivalent gallons.

“ Methane from landfills does not necessarily come from cellulose or hemicellulose.”

WM Response :

The commenters provided no scientific data to support the ir assertion, but instead surmised that LFG is instead, derived from foo d waste. It has been our experience that food waste disposed in the landfill has undergone partial or extensive decomposition before it ever reaches the landfill. This decomposition occurs aerobically in household trashcans , dumpsters,

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collection vehicles and transfer facilities before reaching the landfill. WM supports the Agency’s determination that fuels produced from landfill biogas are qualif ied to generate cellulosic renewable identification numbers (RINs) because the gas is derived from cellulosic
materials . Numerous

, peer

- reviewed studies of municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills across the U.S. have demonstrated that approximately 90 percent of the methane generated by these landfills results from the decomposition of cellulosic material (i.e., cellulose and hemicellulose) 1
While commenters claim that EPA cited only one 1989 study to underpin this conclusion , that is
not true. The footnoted studies below are just a sample of the peer

- reviewed literature available on this subject. Th us, th e Agency’s determination is well supported by scientific data

. Further, the science supports the proposal to qualify the entire volume of renewable fuels

g enerated from landfill biogas as cellulosic where the fuel also meets the required 60 percent greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions.

“ EPA provides no guarantee that biogas electricity will be used for the transportation sector.”

WM Response :

WM believes that the new contract requirements to track renewabl e biogas or renewable electricity when added to a common carrier pipeline or power grid to the final end user are appropriate and reasonable. The requirements for project registration

, which includes third

party verification of the project facilities and contract documentation should provide ample

assurance that the biogas or electricity is used for transportation purposes, and should guard against double counting of RINs due to fraudulent sales to multiple users. The requirements closely track the project certification requirements, as well as the voluntary RIN Quality

1 Barlaz, M. A., September 24, 2011 Letter to EPA citing below references to support landfill methane conclusions. Barlaz, M. A., Ham, R. K. and D. M. Schaefer, 1989, "Mass Balance Analysis of Decomposed Refuse in Laboratory Scale Lysimeters," Journal of Environmental Engineering, ASCE, 115, 6, p. 1088

- 1102.

Barlaz, M. A., Ham, R. K. and D. M. Schaefer, 1990, "Methane Production from Municipal Refuse: A Review of Enhancement Techniques and Microbial Dynamics,” CRC Critical Reviews in Environmental Control, 19, 6, p. 557

- 584.

Eleazer, W. E, Odle, W. S., Wang, Y.

- S. and M. A. Barlaz, 1997, “Biodegradability of Municipal Solid Waste Components in Laboratory

- Scale Landfills,” Env. Sci. Technol., 31, 3, p. 911

- 17.

Mehta, R., Barlaz, M. A., Yazdani, R., Augenstein, D., Bryars, M. and Sinderson, L., 2002,
“R efuse Decomposition in the Presence and Absence of Leachate Recirculation,” J. Env. Eng., 128, 3, 228

- 236.

Barlaz, M. A., 2006, “Forest Products Decomposition in Municipal Solid Waste Landfills,” Waste Management, 26, 4, p. 321

– 33.

Staley, B. F. and M. A. Barlaz, 2009, “Composition of Municipal Solid Waste in the U.S. and Implications for Carbon Sequestration and Methane Yield,” J. Environ. Eng. 135, 10, p. 901

- 909.

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Assurance program. We bel ieve that these requirements are appropriate to ensure the liquidity of the RINs market, and to provide sufficient oversight of RIN generation

.

“ Traditional landfills do not generate commercially usable gas. ”

WM Response :

The LMOP fleet of hundreds of projects and WM ’ s own 138 LFG beneficial use projects provide the clearest response to this silly statement. WM alone produces enough renewable energy from LFG to power over a half a million homes. Our projects provide electricity, which we sell to the grid, we directly pipe landfill gas to end users inclu ding NASA, the University of New Hampshire, Ford, GM and BMW, and produce renewable natural gas suitable for powering over
300 of our own collecti o n vehicles. All beneficial uses of landfill gas require some level of treatment, such as dewatering, filtering, removal of contaminants an d compression to support
the ultimate end use. However, landfill gas is now viewed as an asset rather than a

Waste Management appreciates the opportunity to provide you with our supplemental comments, and we look forward to continuing to work with you as you finalize revisions to the RFS Pathways II rule . Should you have any questions about these comments, please feel free to
call me at 202

- 639

- 1218 or e

- mail me at kkell y5@wm.com

.

Sincerely,

Kerry Kelly, Director
Federal Public & Regulatory Affairs