Landfill Methane Outreach Program
Publications/Tools
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LMOP offers a wide array of free technical, promotional and informational tools as well as services to promote the development of landfill gas (LFG) energy projects. This page is a compilation of publications, brochures, fact sheets and software tools referenced throughout the site. If you have questions, please Contact Us.
Several documents listed below can be accessed online for immediate viewing. Some of the print publications can be ordered from EPA’s National Service Center for Environmental Publications (NSCEP), while EPA’s digital publications are stored in the National Environmental Publications Internet Site (NEPIS) database. Instructions for ordering items from NSCEP/NEPIS are provided below.
Additional Resources
- Gasette
- Technical Documents
- Informational Documents
- Software Tools
- Sample Request for Proposal Files
Technical Documents
Landfill Gas Energy Project Development Handbook
This handbook provides LFG energy project development guidance, with individual chapters about the basics of LFG energy, gas modeling, technology options, economic analysis and financing, contract and permitting considerations, and selection of project partners. The intended audience for this handbook is landfill owners, energy service providers, corporate energy end users, state agencies, local governments, and communities.
Adapting Boilers to Utilize Landfill Gas: An Environmentally and Economically Beneficial Opportunity (PDF) (4 pp, 311K)
Using LFG in place of conventional fuels in a boiler is a common practice that requires minor technical adjustments to the boiler. Virtually any commercial or industrial boiler can be retrofitted to fire LFG and the equipment for retrofitting a boiler to burn LFG is commercially available and proven. This fact sheet discusses the retrofits needed to enable a boiler to operate efficiently using LFG, notes other factors that should be considered related to LFG use in boilers, and provides examples of successful LFG-fired boiler projects.
Landfill Gas Energy: A Guide to Developing and Implementing Greenhouse Gas Reduction Programs (PDF) (34 pp, 2.1MB)
LMOP teamed with EPA’s State and Local Climate and Energy Program to produce this document, one in a series about greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions strategies. This guide focuses on the use of LFG energy to reduce GHG emissions and describes how communities can achieve energy, environmental, health and economic benefits by using LFG recovered from municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills as a source of renewable energy.
Combined Heat and Power Applications—Catalogs of Technologies
- Biomass Combined Heat and Power Catalog of Technologies (PDF) (123 pp, 2.3MB)
This document provides characterizations of biomass combined heat and power (CHP) technologies, including information on biomass resources, energy conversion technologies, and power production systems. - Catalog of CHP Technologies (PDF) (150 pp, 2.8MB)
This document provides an overview of how CHP systems work and information about the cost and performance characteristics of five technologies.
Best Practices for Siting Solar Photovoltaics on Municipal Solid Waste Landfills (PDF) (79 pp, 4.1MB)
EPA’s RE-Powering America's Land Initiative and the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) recently released this document to respond to the increasing demand for assistance with siting solar energy projects on landfills. The document includes examples of solar photovoltaics (PV) projects on landfills and provides best practices to address various technical considerations when determining the feasibility of a solar PV project on a landfill.
Informational Documents
Funding Landfill Gas Energy Projects: State, Federal, and Foundation Resources
LMOP’s funding guide provides detailed information on innovative funding resources available to LFG energy projects. These resources include loans, grants, tax credits and exemptions, and production incentives. For each resource, the guide lists pertinent information such as guidelines, eligibility requirements, and contact information. Landfill owners, project developers, and LFG end users will find the guide useful in identifying potential funding opportunities.
Landfill Methane Outreach Program and Landfill Gas Energy: The Power of Partnership | Brochure (PDF) (4 pp, 401K)
This brochure provides basic information about LMOP, including program goals, products and services, and Partner success stories.
To order this document from the NSCEP/NEPIS website, access it at item number 430F10012. Then add the item to your shopping cart, select the checkbox next to the item, and order the publication. If you would like to order another LMOP document available from NSCEP/NEPIS at the same time without having to re-enter your contact information, come back to this page, select the item number for that document and add it to the NSCEP/NEPIS shopping cart before submitting your order.
Landfill Gas: Creating Green Energy in Your Community (PDF) (2 pp, 310K)
This brochure introduces the layperson to LFG and the benefits of LFG energy. It is a useful tool for marketing LFG energy to communities.
To order this document from the NSCEP/NEPIS website, access it at item number 430F08028. Then add the item to your shopping cart, select the checkbox next to the item, and order the publication. If you would like to order another LMOP document available from NSCEP/NEPIS at the same time without having to re-enter your contact information, come back to this page and select the item number for that document and add it to the NSCEP/NEPIS shopping cart before submitting your order.
LMOP Quick Reference Sheet: Regulations and Proposals Affecting Landfills and LFG Energy Projects (PDF) (2 pp, 79K)
This reference sheet provides basic information about several promulgated or proposed rules that affect landfills and LFG energy projects. The document includes brief summaries of both recently published rules (e.g., National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants (NESHAP) for reciprocating internal combustion engines) and longer established rules (e.g., NESHAP for municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills), along with Web addresses for readers interested in obtaining more detailed information.
Marketing & Communications Toolkit
LMOP’s Marketing & Communications Toolkit was designed to help LMOP Partners, Endorsers, and others to communicate about LFG energy benefits, highlight their LMOP participation, and develop outreach materials. It features sample tools for outreach—including easy-to-use items such as logos, invitations, and press releases—that you can download. The Marketing & Communications Toolkit can help you share the good news about LFG energy projects with your community, employees, shareholders, customers, the media, and other stakeholders.
Landfill Gas Energy: Fueling the Economy and a Sustainable Energy Future (PDF) (1 pg, 81K)
This one-page fact sheet provides information about the current status of LFG energy projects in the United States and the environmental benefits attributable to these projects. It also offers the estimated economic and job creation benefits of a typically sized LFG electricity project, and provides examples of actual annual cost savings experienced by organizations that are using LFG beneficially.
Green Power From Landfill Gas (PDF) (1 pg, 164K)
This one-page fact sheet provides information about LFG as a renewable energy resource, describes how LFG fits so well into green power programs, and displays logos for a sampling of utilities and cooperatives that generate electricity from LFG. It also provides summary information on the current status of LFG energy projects in the United States and the environmental benefits that these projects provide.
State Resources
LMOP provides a table of key state organizations’ websites to assist those searching for state-specific information related to permits and regulations that may affect LFG energy projects. The list represents the main state agencies and departments involved in topics such as air quality permitting, energy policy, and public utility regulation.
Software Tools
LFG Energy Benefits Calculator
This calculator estimates the direct methane, avoided carbon dioxide, and total greenhouse gas reductions attributable to an LFG energy project for the current year, calculated from the project size entered by the user. Based on the estimated emission reductions, the tool provides environmental benefit values to put the reductions in more understandable terms, such as an equivalent quantity of passenger vehicles, acres of forests, railcars of coal, or gallons of gasoline. Based on the project size, the calculator also estimates an energy benefit value in terms of homes powered or homes heated.
Interactive Conversion Tool
This tool can be used to conduct unit conversions, such as standard cubic feet per minute (scfm) to million standard cubic feet per day (mmscfd) or short tons of methane to million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalents (MMTCO2E). It can also be used to estimate LFG energy potential from a municipal solid waste (MSW) landfill, including tons of waste-in-place (WIP) to scfm of LFG or megawatt (MW) capacity, and much more.
LMOP Locator
The LMOP Locator, a tool designed in Microsoft® Access, allows a user to geographically search for facilities that can potentially utilize LFG, or for landfills located near a facility that is interested in utilizing LFG. The user must provide basic location information for the landfill or potential end user, searching by latitude/longitude, zip code, and/or state/county for a single site or up to 10 sites at a time. The user can then select the resulting landfills or facilities that are of most interest and export the results to a file.
For the pool of potential end users, the LMOP Locator contains select data from EPA’s National Emissions Inventory, EPA’s Boiler/Process Heater NESHAP 2008 Survey database, EPA’s Renewable Fuel Standards List of Registered Fuel Providers, and purchased business data. For landfill searches, the tool contains data for all landfills in the current LMOP Landfill and LFG Energy Project database.
Download LMOPLocatorV4.0-Web-June082012 (ZIP*, 29 MB) and unzip the file. The file contains the LMOPLocatorV4.0-Web.mdb file, two Excel template (.xlt) files, and a User’s Guide (.pdf) file. The LMOP landfill/project data are current as of June 1, 2012.
If you have any issues with downloading or using this tool, please submit this contact form including your name, organization, email address, and a description of your question in the Comments/Questions box. (*Zip files can be opened with the free evaluation version of WinZip. 
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LFGcost–Web–Landfill Gas Energy Cost Model
Evaluate the economic feasibility and job creation benefits of an LFG energy project using this software model. LFGcost-Web is currently available to LMOP Partners and Endorsers only. For information on becoming a Partner or Endorser, visit Join LMOP.
Landfill Gas Modeling Tools
- Landfill Gas Emissions Model (LandGEM)
- Central America Landfill Gas Model
- China Landfill Gas Model
- Colombia Landfill Gas Model
- Ecuador Landfill Gas Model
- Mexico Landfill Gas Model 2.0
- Philippines Landfill Gas Model
- Thailand Landfill Gas Model
- Ukraine Landfill Gas Model
Landfill Gas Emissions Model (LandGEM)
The Landfill Gas Emissions Model (LandGEM version 3.02, released May 12, 2005) is an automated tool for estimating emission rates from municipal solid waste (MSW) landfills. The model was developed by the EPA Office of Research and Development-National Risk Management Research Laboratory, and the Clean Air Technology Center. The model can be used to estimate total LFG and methane generation, as well as emissions of carbon dioxide, nonmethane organic compounds, and individual air pollutants from landfills. Model results can be used to estimate the recoverable methane available for a potential LFG energy project. LandGEM can also be used by landfill owners and operators to determine if a landfill is subject to the control requirements of the federal New Source Performance Standard (NSPS) for new MSW landfills, the emission guidelines for existing MSW landfills, or the National Emission Standards for Hazardous Air Pollutants (NESHAP) for MSW landfills.
Version 3.02 replaced versions 2.01 and 3.01 and is a user-friendly version with a Microsoft Excel interface, greater accuracy, and enhanced capabilities. For example, version 3.02 enables the user to estimate total LFG generation, which can be calibrated with a user-specified methane concentration other than 50 percent. It includes new default values to estimate emissions from wet landfills, such as bioreactors. Users can choose from a wider range of units of measure for inputs and outputs.
In addition to the LandGEM Version 3.02 Excel file, users should also download the "ReadMe First" file and User’s Guide, which contain key information necessary to properly operate the model.
Central America Landfill Gas Model
LMOP co-developed the Central America Landfill Gas Model to help landfill owners and operators, end users of LFG, and other interested parties in Central America (Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama) evaluate the feasibility and potential benefits of collecting and using LFG for energy recovery.
China Landfill Gas Model
LMOP developed the China Landfill Gas Model to estimate LFG generation rates from landfills, and potential LFG recovery rates for landfills that have, or plan to have, gas collection and control systems in China.
Colombia Landfill Gas Model
LMOP developed the Colombia Landfill Gas Model to estimate LFG generation rates from landfills and help stakeholders evaluate the feasibility and potential benefits of collecting and using LFG for energy recovery in Colombia.
Ecuador Landfill Gas Model
LMOP developed the Ecuador Landfill Gas Model to help landfill owners and operators and other interested parties evaluate the feasibility and potential benefits of collecting and using LFG for energy recovery in Ecuador.
Mexico Landfill Gas Model 2.0
To develop Mexico Landfill Gas Model Version 2.0, LMOP collected additional field data and applied advanced modeling techniques to update and refine Version 1.0. The Model Version 2.0 incorporates waste composition data from Version 1.0 and expands the data to include information from additional cities and landfills throughout Mexico.
Philippines Landfill Gas Model
LMOP developed the Philippines Landfill Gas Model to help landfill owners and operators, end users of LFG, and other interested parties in the Philippines evaluate the feasibility and potential benefits of collecting and using LFG for energy recovery.
Thailand Landfill Gas Model
LMOP developed Thailand Landfill Gas Model to help landfill owners and operators, end users of LFG, and other interested parties in Thailand evaluate the feasibility and potential benefits of collecting and using LFG for energy recovery. The model is available in both English and Thai.
Ukraine Landfill Gas Model
LMOP developed the Ukraine Landfill Gas Model to help landfill owners and operators, end users of LFG, and other interested parties in Ukraine evaluate the feasibility and potential benefits of collecting and using LFG for energy recovery.
Sample Request for Proposal Files
Parties interested in writing a request for proposals (RFP) can peruse sample RFPs that LMOP has acquired through its assistance to communities seeking to develop LFG energy projects. The sample RFPs are sorted according to the type of energy project or other service being sought. LMOP provides this information as a service but does not endorse the information or opinions included therein.