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https://raleighnc.gov/projects/bioenergy-recovery-project-0
08/28/2025 5:39 pm

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Bioenergy Recovery Project

Striving to Achieve the City's Sustainability Goals

Updated: Aug 28, 2025

What you flush today might fuel a bus tomorrow. The Bioenergy Recovery Project is converting Raleigh's biosolids (yes, what you flush) into renewable natural gas. This clean energy will power over 70 GoRaleigh buses daily, making Raleigh one of the first cities in the nation—and the first in North Carolina—to utilize biogas from its own wastewater facility to fuel its vehicles.

This new system makes green energy by producing biogas and uses a modern method to process the biosolids.
For more information, please visit our project page. 

Benefits 

  • This project is focused on creating a renewable fuel mainly for the GoRaleigh bus fleet in the City.
  • It will help decrease the amount of Biosolids.
  • Biogas will be produced, gathered, and transformed into renewable natural gas, which will then be sent to a nearby natural gas pipeline.

Project Details

 
Type:
Water and Sewer
Budget:
$227,163,000
Project Lead:
Edward Stempien, PE
Contractors:
Crowder Construction Company (Construction Manager) and Hazen & Black & Veatch (Engineer of Record)

Contact

 

Edward Stempien, PE
Senior Project Administrator
Phone: 919-996-3490 
Office Location: 1 Exchange Plaza Suite 620
Raleigh, NC 27601 

Lead Department:
Water
Participating Department:
Water
Service Unit:
Water Treatment

Subscribe

 

Planning

This project page is complete.

Lead Department:
Water

Design

This project phase is complete.

Lead Department:
Water

Construction

The Bioenergy Recovery Project has completing work on anaerobic processed sludge using a new thermal hydrolysis method. This advanced anaerobic digestion technique is reducing the final solids produced by over 50 percent compared from what it used to be. The plant team has been adjusting the process and getting the needed permits for the renewable natural gas cleaning and compression system. 

The Sidestream process, which deals with discharge wastewater from the new treatment system while greatly lowering chemical and energy use, is now in the commissioning phase. This phase could take as long as 9 months to grow the microorganisms that are important for the process. 

Started in the spring of 2019, the project is expected to be completed by the summer of 2025.

Lead Department:
Water

Complete

Check back for phase updates.

Lead Department:
Water
DateActivity
Summer 2019Project Design Complete
OngoingPermitting Complete
N/AEasement Acquisition Complete
Summer 2019Project Bid Complete
Summer 2019Project Construction Begins
Summer 2025Project Construction Complete

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