Five old landfill sites in Tucson, Arizona, will be studied by the U.S. Environment Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy to see whether or not they could be acceptable sites for green energy projects, reported the Arizona Daily Star.

The study will last one year, and a particular emphasis will be placed on the 61-acre Vincent Mullins Landfill near Speedway and Kolb roads. Many landfills generate gases from decomposing materials, said the newspaper, making these inspections crucial to determining the safety of site development.

Jeffrey Drumm, a project manager with the city's Environmental Services department, told the paper that the city is very interested in the results from the study. Tucson officials are anxious to know if renewable energy projects can be started by private companies and if they will be able to provide power to other facilities.

More renewable energy news coming out of Tucson is that the University of Arizona recently announced the installation of a 10-kilowatt pilot solar project located at Biosphere 2, an ecological research and teaching facility.