Methane from cellulose in sewage

Implications: There is a huge amount of cellulose in municipal sewage and represents enormous potential for producing an energy source from a current discarded material.  What would it take to make this commercially feasible? If a process could be proven effective, every municipality in the US could incorporate this into their strategy. Which companies are willing to tackle this project?  Is anything being done currently?  The capital investment might be less than some might estimate.

Analysis: The Gulf Chemical Co, back in the late 70's and early 80's set up a pilot plant in Louisville, KY to reclaim the cellulose in the city's sewage.  Separating it from the human waste and other contaminents had evidently been solved.  The recovered cellulose was then going to be processed to produce methane gas.  After two years the project was abandoned for (a) lack of interest (b) lack of funds and (c)the price and availability of methane was not a concern at that time.

However, much has changed!   The public would not embrace a project like this and the revenue from the methane produced would help any city's finances.   We believe it would be worthwhile to investigate just what Gulf Chemicals (a division of the then Gulf Oil Co.) was able to accomplish and what unanswered questions remained when the project was cancelled.  We believe there's much to learn.