Advantek®‘s Terminal Island Site

The Terminal Island Site is operated by our partner, Advantek Waste Management Services,​ who commercialized our core technology (and spun out Vaulted). Vaulted takes Advantek’s mature slurry injection technology and applies it to organic waste and carbon removal.

Location: Los Angeles, California​
Start date: 2008​
Annual volume: 65,000 tons

A scalable solution for a big city

Advantek’s Terminal Island Site (TIRE) was the first full-scale facility in the U.S. to inject biosolids (treated sewage sludge) deep below the surface for safe disposal. Located within the City of LA’s Terminal Island Water Recovery Plant, the site has the capability to process 100% of all the biosolids produced by the city every single day for the next 100 years and beyond.

15+ years of proven safe operations​
storing 20% of the City of Los Angeles’ biosolids deep underground

Secure operations in sensitive geology ​

Currently takes 20% of the biosolids in LA, withover 500K tons of biosolids injected to date and no leaks​.

The biosolids have undergone both aerobic and anerobic digestion, which helps, but doesn’t finish the job​.

Permitted by the federal EPA in 2008, renewed in 2022 with a comfort letter from the federal EPA as a permanent, safe endpoint​.

Designed and rigorously monitored by the EPA to prevent causing seismic activity even while operating in one of the most naturally seismically active regions in the country​.

Have Questions?

No. The geologic conditions at our injection sites make leakage extremely unlikely. At depth, any CO₂ generated dissolves into the brine, and methane — if generated at all — remains trapped within the formations’ pore space, sealed beneath an impermeable rock layer. 

No. Our partner Advantek has safely operated this technology at the TIRE facility for over 15 years with no earthquakes linked to our operations — validated by the EPA. The injection formations were specifically chosen for their low risk of inducing felt seismic events. We also conduct real-time seismic monitoring and adjust injection rates and volumes as needed. In 2019, the EPA issued a comfort letter confirming the safety of our technology, and reissued a 10-year permit in 2022. 

TIRE currently handles 20% of the City of Los Angeles’ biosolids. The remaining 80% are land-applied elsewhere for fertilization or disposal. However, biosolids applied to land can contain PFAS and other pathogens, which pose risks to soil and groundwater. TIRE offers a safer alternative, reducing local pollution while avoiding methane emissions from decomposition and the emissions associated with long-distance transport. 

The site has not generated carbon credits to date. It will not generate carbon credits on any historical injection, nor on the baseline tonnage (the amount of waste the site has historically injected every year), which has been covered by tipping fees. The site will generate carbon credits only on additional tonnage over the baseline, unlocked by the carbon credit revenue.   

While we leverage the geomechanics of hydraulic fracturing, slurry injection isn’t the same as fracking for oil and gas. Our techniques don’t result in more oil and gas production, nor do they result in large volumes of contaminated produced brines that are often disposed of in ways that can trigger seismicity. Additionally, we only inject non-hazardous waste, and we do so under permits issued by the EPA or state equivalent.