Virginia Beach wants the flush to help power 5,000 homes — turning sewage gas into energy instead of burning it off

Every day, the Hampton Roads treatment plant in Virginia Beach makes gas as tiny organisms break down sewage — and today that gas is simply burned off in a flare. A proposed $30 million project with Virginia Natural Gas would clean that biogas up and pipe it into the local gas network, enough each year for about 5,000 homes. The plan still needs approval from Virginia's State Corporation Commission, and customers would pay about 36 cents more a month at first. A smaller version in Roanoke has been running since 2023, supplying about 500 homes — proof the idea already works down the road.

SDG 7 · Affordable and clean energy — Mechanism: infrastructure build