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By Terry Judd | MiEnergy
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Scott Erdman envisions a grand transformation for a former wastewater treatment site in Whitehall into a biofuel production facility for his company, Silver Creek Energy Lab. PHOTO: TERRY JUDD

WHITEHALL — For decades, raw sewage flowed into the Muskegon County Wastewater Treatment Facility in Whitehall for the sole purpose of getting rid of it in an environmentally responsible manner.

Today, different kinds of waste are being brought to the same site but with a different goal — producing energy. The former wastewater treatment facility now is home for the Silver Creek Energy Lab, a unique collaboration among academia, industry, businesses and government to make Muskegon County a leader in bio-energy development and production.

The unassuming lab is the vision of Erdman Machine Co. President Scott Erdman who purchased the property from Muskegon County last year for about $1.3 million through Erdman Holdings Inc.

Since 1973, the Whitehall site had been the satellite facility for the much larger 11,000-acre Muskegon County Wastewater Treatment facility in Egelston and Moorland townships.

The Whitehall site was shuttered once a pipeline was built to connect the north portion of the county to the Ottawa Street pumping station in Muskegon, which is linked to the larger wastewater treatment facility. The county had been trying to sell the Whitehall site for the last 10 years.

Techniques being developed in the laboratory eventually will be used by Erdman Holdings’ Silver Creek Energy to produce bio-energy fuels from common wastes like restaurant grease and animal fat.

“We eventually will have a full-scale plant at the site, “ Erdman told MiEnergy. “But right now we’re taking baby steps. We are doing small-scale pilots that will be used by a large plant. We want to create optimal alternative fuels.”

By working with Muskegon Community College, Grand Valley State University, Michigan State University, Hope College and the Whitehall and Montague school districts, Silver Creek Energy Lab slowly is fine tuning its waste-to-energy process and analyzing the quality of fuels being produced.

Late last month, the Silver Creek Energy Lab and Muskegon Community College held an open house to publicize the baby-steps taken so far at the lab and the giant leaps envisioned for the future. Visitors learned of a process to convert waste cheese whey into methane gas and meat wastes into bio-diesel fuel.

“In the next five years, we will see tremendous growth,” Erdman said. “We should be able to produce diesel fuel not only from waste, but from algae as well.”

Erdman acknowledges that much of the equipment and technology for waste-to-energy fuels exists in Europe, but “not everyone has the answer.” That is the reason Silver Creek Energy Lab is working on small scales to develop the best processes using local talent.

The process being used is anaerobic transformation, which uses anaerobic bacteria to break down waste materials. Anaerobic bacteria require no or little oxygen. A byproduct of this particular digestive process is methane gas. The key, however, is finding the correct bacteria to do the job and creating the proper conditions for optimal bio-fuel production.

One major partner in finding this key is Muskegon Community College, which purchased about $45,000 in equipment for the fledgling laboratory through a state grant and is providing expertise perfecting the process of turning food wastes into energy.

Gregg Marczak, associate VP of academic affairs at MCC, said the lab is an excellent example of “learning by doing.”

“It would have been very easy for Scott Erdman to have gone to Europe and purchased equipment, but that is very expensive,” Marczak said. “What Scott is trying to do is ‘let’s get it running on a small scale, then let’s scale it up, then let’s scale it up again. Let’s learn by doing.’”

While much of the process is chemistry, it also involves microbiology requiring significant research. MCC officials reached out to other universities to create multiple partnerships. Although the lab primarily is staffed by MCC teachers and will be used as a working classroom for students, Marczak stressed it is available to other trained people.

“We want to make this into a regional facility for learning and a place where others can get their own bio-fuels tested. Our vision is to open up to other trained people,” he said.

“We have a larger goal of making sure that the energy that is produced is regional, that we are the leaders. We mean that and are very serious. By leaders, we mean producing energy in an economically viable way. This is a West Michigan alternative energy bi-fuels center. We want others to have access to it.”

Scott Hladki, maintenance supervisor for the energy facility, said MCC’s assistance has been vital to the operation. Prior to that, testing was basically a hit-or-miss process.

“We did not have the knowledge of what to add, how much and how often,” he said. “What we needed was for teachers and students to come out and give use the proper formula.”

Hladki said immediate plans call for bio-diesel fuel produced to be used by machinery and equipment on the site. Eventually, excess fuel will be sold. Methane gas primarily will be used to run electricity-producing generators to provide electricity on site, to Erdman Machine Co. and eventually to the regional power grid. Erdman Machine’s monthly electricity bill is about $10,000.

Food wastes used so far include meat and fat scraps from Hazekamp Meats Inc., cheese whey from Aria Dairy and used cooking oil and grease from area restaurants.

Although waste to energy will be a major focus for the former wastewater treatment facility, Erdman envisions a multi-use facility. The property now has an alfalfa crop growing on 150 acres, a small herd of beef cattle and a hardwood forest that has been selectively harvested to promote older tree growth.

Future plans call for using some of the facility’s former effluent holding lagoons to grow algae, which can be harvested to produce diesel fuel.

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• aria dairy
• erdman machine
• gregg marczak
• hazekamp meats
• scott erdman
• scott hladki
• whitehall