City of Manteca Saves Money While Saving the Environment

The City of Manteca is taking proactive steps to minimize its budget and ratepayer costs by creating its own fuel for its Solid Waste Fleet of vehicles. Not only do these efforts result in hundreds of thousands of dollars in savings, but they ensure the City meets compliance requirements from the California Air Resources Board (CARB) and the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District (SJVAPCD).

Manteca’s Waste-to-Fuel Program is a two-phase process of diverting organic waste produced in the City landfill to become carbon-negative transportation fuel. The program won an “Engineering Achievement” award from the California Water Environment Association – North San Joaquin Division (CWEA-NSJ) in 2018, and a “Project Excellence Award” from the Water Environment Federation (WEF) in 2019. The City is currently under construction of Phase II and will soon have a Food Waste Separator that will feed into the City’s Digester to turn even more waste into fuel.

Specialized facilities capture wastewater solids, commercially generated food waste, and fats, oils & grease (FOG), funneling them to the Waste-to-Fuel Facility. The resulting Biogas gets purified through a multi-week process, then sent to compressed natural gas (CNG) pumps for distribution into eight CNG garbage trucks. Manteca plans on converting its 14 other garbage trucks to CNG within the next five years, lessening its dependence on gasoline, diesel fuel and liquid propane.

Funded by SJVAPCD and a California Energy Commission (CEC) grant totaling nearly $5 million, the program meets the CARB requirements for emissions, aligns with recent State legislation concerning diversion of food waste from landfills, and saves ratepayers an estimated $500,000 – $1 million annually in fuel costs. 

Visit the City of Manteca website to learn more about their Waste-to-Fuel Program.