An Aberdeen landfill site will soon be generating enough green energy to power 1,700 city homes for at least the next 10 years.

Aberdeen City Council and recycling and waste management company, SITA UK, have reached an agreement to convert methane gas generated at the Hill of Tramaud landfill site into electricity which will be fed into the National Grid.

Approximately one megawatt of power will be generated, which is equivalent to the annual consumption of a community roughly the size of Kingswells, and the company estimates that energy will be produced at the site, which is to the north of Aberdeen, for at least a decade.

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Methane - a greenhouse gas - is produced in landfill sites by rotting biodegradable waste. Securing the agreement, which includes a revenue sharing element means that this gas, which would otherwise be burnt off via a flare, will soon be collected via a network of pipes and extracted to generate electricity.

Producing this renewable energy will directly replace the production of electricity by fossil fuels and is expected to save more than 3,500 tonnes of carbon per year.

Councillor Kevin Stewart, the council's representative on the Waste Management Services Contract Management Board said: "This is a really good agreement for Aberdeen because not only will it reduce the city's carbon footprint and put in place a robust gas management scheme, it will also bring money into Aberdeen from the sale of the green electricity generated."

Commenting on the agreement, Tim Otley at SITA UK said: "It makes good environmental sense to generate renewable electricity from landfill gas, so we are very pleased to have secured this agreement. We expect to begin producing electricity in 2010.

"Although we are now developing alternatives to landfill, it is good that we can reduce the environmental effects of this site."

(GK/JM)