Loudoun County’s Board of Supervisors hopes to turn a harmful gas from the county’s landfill into renewable natural gas, perhaps within the next five years.
Loudoun’s landfill, located on Evergreen Mills Road outside Leesburg, opened in 1971 and spans 180 acres. When its life span ends — in approximately 60 years — it will have received over 9 million tons of waste over its lifetime, according to county officials.
“Whenever trash decomposes, it produces a lot of gasses,” said Assistant Director of General Services Marc Aveni, during a March 11 presentation to the board’s finance committee. “In particular, a gas known as methane, which is one of the most harmful greenhouse gas emissions that we have.”
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, municipal solid waste landfills are the third-largest source of human-related methane emissions in the country, accounting for approximately 14.4% of these emissions in 2022.
Aveni said most landfills, including Loudoun County’s, “flare” methane by collecting and then burning it in a controlled manner.
“But we can do much better than that,” he said.
“It can also be captured and refined as a potential clean energy source,” Aveni added. “Renewable natural gas, or RNG, is the one we’re most interested in.”
Aveni said a vendor — or the county, through a capital project — could put in filters and other equipment to capture, distill and refine methane gas and put it into a pipeline for further use, including fueling the county’s RNG buses.
“We’re really just taking that gas and turning it into another source of energy that has value,” Aveni said. “RNG has a lot of value, currently. There’s a lot of demand for this renewable natural gas.”
The push for the county to join jurisdictions that use public-private partnerships to produce green hydrogen began in 2022, at the suggestion of Sterling Supervisor Koran Saines.
Prince William County is currently operating an RNG facility that converts methane from its landfill, which is located on Dumfries Road outside Manassas.
Aveni estimated the county could put out a request for proposal within the next year, and could be processing methane within five years.
Get breaking news and daily headlines delivered to your email inbox by signing up here.
© 2025 WTOP. All Rights Reserved. This website is not intended for users located within the European Economic Area.
