Startup Targets Small Landfill Gas to Ease EV Power Grid Strain

A few years ago, Adam Wright was walking through a Berkeley, Calif., park when he encountered a smokestack combusting methane. The flare was the city’s mitigation measure to break down the gas seeping from a landfill that had closed decades earlier and been converted into a bayside amenity.

The constant supply of gas sparked an idea: What if he could generate electricity with it? Tying together individual small landfills across the country could power things like electric vehicle charging, Wright thought.

Not long after that stroll, Wright co-founded Vespene Energy.

Over the ...