WESTOVER, Md. (AP) — A Northern Virginia firms plans to build a power plant at a prison on Maryland’s Eastern Shore that will produce electricity from chicken manure.

The plant is expected to be running by 2013 at the Eastern Correctional Institution in Westover. The Maryland Board of Public Works approved a contract this week with EcoCorp of Northern Virginia to build the anaerobic digester plant. The system uses bacteria to break down manure to create methane, the principal component of natural gas.

The Daily Times of Salisbury reports the plant, which will produce 1 megawatt of electricity from 5,500 tons of poultry litter a year, is the latest green energy plant approved for a state prison. Development of a solar power installation is already under way at a prison in western Maryland.

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