How Does an Energy From Waste Facility Work?

The idea of creating energy from waste is a noble one, it acknowledges that we have to be aware of waste but also realises that it has to be dealt with in a responsible way – not just chucked into a landfill. There are a great many different aspects of how an energy from waste facility works, but this Instructable will break down the fundamentals.

Energy from waste is essentially a process that makes use of non-recyclable materials. This is most commonly achieved by incinerating it, which then creates electricity. We shall go into more detail later. There are now many waste-to-energy plants being rolled out across the UK – which gives some clue as to their effectiveness.

One of the earliest adopters of this technology was the Scandinavian nations of Norway and Sweden. They have had considerable influence on developing this technology.

In fact, they worked so well that Sweden recently ran out of waste and was forced to start importing.

That’s a dream scenario for many nations with toxic landfills. So, let’s look at how they work in a bit more detail.

The first step in creating energy from waste is sorting. A shipment or container is received by the facility, at which point it is processed through an automated sorting system. This is done to make sure that every piece of recyclable material is removed and recycled at another location.

These recyclable materials include many things such as;

• Metals – There is great value in metal, and it’s tremendously useful for different industries – as a result it’s a prime recyclable that is removed from the rest of the waste. They are often sent to metal merchants, who pay for scrap metals.

• Bricks – Many pieces of soil, bricks and hardcore are present in the overall waste. These are tremendously useful for industries such as the construction trade, and as a result they are taken out and sent to these kinds of industries for reuse.

• Plastics – Plastics require specialist processing in order for them to be treated and recycled. They are not suitable for energy from waste; therefore they are recycled separately from other materials using different machinery and techniques.

Once the process of sorting is completed, all of the different types of recyclable materials are removed and what is left is simply a mass of non-recyclable waste – which is to be turned into energy.

Hold on, you might be saying, it’s not that easy to find every single piece of recyclable material in a container of waste. Well, that’s why after sorting the remaining waste is finely shredded by powerful machines.

It is then screened to remove any kind of trace metal fragments that may have been missed. These are then collected and removed from the remaining waste – which is entirely unrecyclable.

This ensures that every possible useful element of the waste is removed, and prevents the incineration of potentially useful materials.

The waste is now ready to be incinerated, which generates a huge amount of energy. This is then harnessed in the following ways;

• Heat warms up water in pipes surrounding the incinerator.
• The water turns to steam and spins round the pipe system with great force as it becomes superheated.
• The steam hits turbines within the pipework.
• These turbines generate electricity that is transferred to the electrical grid.

This makes for a very efficient use of non-recyclable waste. The output that is capable of being produced can 5 megawatts, depending on the individual facility. And it’s all green!

You might be thinking that burning all that waste will create a huge amount of exhaust, which then goes into the atmosphere and thus diminishes the benefits of the electricity production. Well, you’d be right to be concerned – however the exhaust is handled differently to other types of incinerations.

It is filtered and cooled, which allows for all the polluting debris to be collected instead of going into the atmosphere. After it is filtered, the remaining waste after the incineration – in addition to the exhaust waste – can be put into landfill

There is a huge amount waste generated by our species, and we need to minimise the impact of that. By utilising energy from waste plants we’re able to reduce the impact we have on the world around us – this makes it a very important environmental technology. And, as Sweden experienced when they ran out of waste and started importing, it works very well!

Thanks for reading. I’d love to know what you think, so please feel free to let me know. I hope you read the rest of my work on Instructables, I’d especially recommend reading “5 Steps To Becoming A Successful Project Manager”.

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