Cleveland Home To New 'Gasification' Power Plant

CLEVELAND (AP) — The city of Cleveland will soon be burning trash to power homes and businesses.

A $1.5 million agreement signed with the New Jersey-based Princeton Environmental Group would design a 20-megawatt power plant fueled by municipal waste.

The plant, the first of its kind in the U.S., would cost about $200 million and employ about 100 people. It could supply about 6 percent of Cleveland Public Power's peak load.

The city is still deciding how the plant will be financed.

A design group will move to Cleveland immediately to begin developing the plant.

It will turn organic waste into a combustible gas that is then burned to fuel a steam boiler, turbine and generator. The environmentally friendly process, known as "gasification," has been used for decades in Japan.