NEWARK, NJ -- The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey has awarded Clean Energy Fuels Corp. and Covanta Essex a contract to build and operate a compressed natural gas (CNG) fueling station at the Essex County Resource Recovery Facility in Newark, N.J.

Covanta Essex is a subsidiary of Covanta Energy Corp. The planned station will support growing demand for natural gas-fueled refuse vehicles in New Jersey, the companies said.

The CNG fueling station will be built and operated by Clean Energy on the Covanta Essex site. The station will serve public and private municipal waste haulers with CNG fleets.

“The deployment of natural gas-fueled refuse trucks is a win-win for the resource recovery facility and for the communities it serves, providing a greener collection process and reducing overall costs,” said Mark Riley, Clean Energy’s general manager for the Eastern U.S. region. “We are pleased to be able to support the region with this valuable fueling resource.”

Covanta Essex operates the Essex County Resource Recovery Facility (ECRRF), which is owned by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. The ECRRF is an energy-from-waste (EfW) facility, located off the New Jersey Turnpike at Exit 15E in Newark, N.J. 

The ECRRF facility generates approximately 500,000 megawatt hours of clean, renewable energy from municipal solid waste per year, while also recycling about 15,000 tons of metal. The facility reduces the need for over 350,000 tons of coal that would be needed to create the same amount of electricity, and also offsets 900,000 tons of greenhouse gases annually. This is possible due to the avoidance of methane from landfills, the offset of greenhouse gases from fossil fuel electrical production, and the recovery of metals for recycling.

“Covanta Essex is pleased to help in the conversion of refuse trucks to cleaner, more efficient technologies like natural gas,” said Hank Asher, Covanta Essex business manager. “Providing a cleaner fuel for trucks delivering municipal solid waste to our facility is a perfect complement to what we do here: generating clean, renewable energy.”

Construction of the new fueling station is expected to commence during the third quarter of 2011.The project is being partially funded by a grant from the New Jersey Clean Cities Coalition.

This project is part of a larger grant award from the U.S. Department of Energy using funding provided by the American Reinvestment and Recovery Act.

Clean Energy is a major provider of natural gas fuel for transportation in North America.