Producing energy from waste is one of the effective solutions to get rid of it, reduce environmental pollution, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and produce energy locally.
There are two ways to produce energy from waste: direct burning and methane production from landfills, in addition to producing methane from animal manure.
1-Benefits of solid waste-to-energy projects:
Economic benefits: waste requires large land, and the preparation of landfills is expensive, as the costs of preparing large landfills reach more than 500 million dollars. Also, shipping waste by land and sea to distant regions or countries for disposal is also costly. If these costs are compared with the costs of building a waste incineration plant and generating energy from it, we find that there are significant savings.
Among the economic benefits are the proceeds from the sale of electricity, hot water, and minerals (scrap or scrap). In the case of oil and gas producing countries, using waste to generate electricity means saving quantities of oil and gas for export without any additional costs, or using it in areas that generate more added value than if oil and gas were burned to generate electricity.
Environmental benefits: There is no doubt that burning waste generates carbon dioxide and some other gases. However, if we look at the net gases emitted from beginning to end, we will find that projects for converting waste into energy are environmentally friendly. For example, one of the most important gases emitted from waste is methane, which is much more dangerous than carbon dioxide. In addition, the carbon dioxide produced by combustion is less than the case of transporting waste to other countries by land and sea, as the gases emitted from the exhaust of trucks and ships are much greater. One of the environmental benefits is that the amount of gases resulting from combustion is less than the amount of gases resulting from burning coal or oil to generate the same amount of electricity.
Tourism benefits: In some places, such as Miyashima Station in Osaka in Japan, the station has been turned into a piece of art and a tourist attraction for tourists from all over the world, which has energized the area in which the station is located economically, although it was originally far from being A kiss for tourists.
2-ways to produce energy:
1-direct burning:
Many countries and cities have established plants to generate electricity or heat by direct burning of solid waste.
In Vienna, the "Spatilo" station has become a landmark of the city because of its towering chimney, which looks like a beautiful lighthouse, or a towering two-tone: silver and gold, where the whole station has been transformed into a piece of art, befitting the reputation of Vienna. This station burns 250,000 tons of residential sector waste each year, which produces 120,000 megawatt-hours of electricity, 500,000 megawatt-hours in the form of central heating, and 6,000 tons of iron that can be recycled, benefiting 60,000 homes. In Vienna in heating.
In Osaka, Japan, the "Miyashima" power plant from waste looks like a children's amusement park, and tourists from all over the world come to see it. The plant burns 330,000 tons of solid waste annually, and has an estimated production capacity of 32,000 kilowatts of electricity. There are dozens of similar stations in Japan, but they do not compare to the beauty of "Miyashima" station.
As for the Vancouver plant in Canada, it burns 260,000 tons of waste annually, and generates enough electricity for 16,000 homes. The municipality generates revenue of C$8 million annually from sales of electricity and $300,000 from the sale of iron and other metals.
The Lugangzen plant in Shanghai, China, is one of the largest plants in the world that converts solid waste into energy, burning one million tons of waste per year, with a capacity of 60,000 kilowatts of electricity.
There are dozens of global cities that have similar stations in many industrialized countries.
And now we come to Sharjah, where a solid waste-to-energy plant is currently being built in its waste-to-energy plant, with a capacity of 30 megawatts, enough to supply 28,000 homes with electricity. 300,000 tons of waste will be treated annually, as the project contributes to Sharjah's avoidance of sending any solid waste to landfills by 2021.
The project is the result of a collaboration between the two companies "Masdar" and "Bee'ah". Perhaps one of its most important benefits is that it will provide 45 million cubic meters of natural gas, quantities that would have been burned to generate electricity if this project had not been built. These quantities will be transferred to the industrial sector for use as feedstock that creates much more added value than burning it in power stations. The project will also significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
2-methane production:
Waste placed in landfills produces large amounts of methane as a result of its decomposition. And methane is one of the most dangerous greenhouse gases. Therefore, it is disposed of in one of two ways, the first: placing vertical pipes from the landfill core to its surface and burning methane.
That is why we see in some countries and states of the United States multiple flames illuminating some of the hills at night.
These hills are nothing but landfills. The second, instead of burning gas, pipes are extended to a nearby power station to benefit from the gas, or to a nearby factory to heat water or other things. For example, one of the largest landfills in the US state of Georgia sells methane gas to a nearby factory that produces dog and cat food. The gas from the landfill is used to cook the animal food.
Failure to deal properly with methane gas in landfills does not only lead to an environmental disaster, but may lead to a major disaster due to explosions, fires and collapses, which is something that happened in several Arab and non-Arab cities. From here, we find that the issue is not only financial returns, but also the avoidance of major disasters, which may lead to loss of life and property.
3-animal dung:
Animal manure is a missed investment opportunity in a number of Arab countries. In American cows and pig farms, and a number of European countries, animal dung is collected in a large pit, and mixed with water and some substances that stimulate fermentation, and methane gas is produced, which is collected and sold to the nearby power station, or used on the farm itself, either to generate electricity locally. or to heat the water.
In sum, projects to use energy from waste achieve several economic and environmental goals, in addition to serving the community. There are few projects that achieve such goals combined.
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