Hydro energy recovery from a treated landfill leachate

The Easy Hydro team visited an active landfill in southern Europe. Due to its location on a mountain top and in order not to contaminate the nearby aquifers, the site must continuously capture and treat the leachate. Produced by the organic waste decomposition process as well as the rainwater, which falls within the perimeter of the landfill.

To accomplish this, a treatment plant has recently been built to perform an onsite preliminary water treatment. The partially treated water then flows by gravity to a nearby urban wastewater treatment plant via a 6 km pipeline.

A view from the top of the landfill
The existing leachate pumping station, which can be entirely fed by the Easy Hydro turbine

Easy Hydro is collaborating with the landfill operator to assess the feasibility of installing multiple turbines along the outfall pipeline which could help the site reduce the amount of electricity currently being imported from the grid.