Anaerobic digestion of municipal solid waste: residual waste

L. De Baere, Managing Director OWS

The anaerobic digestion of the so-called grey or residual waste fraction coming from MSW is becoming more and more important. Anaerobic digestion of municipal solid waste developed very rapidly in Europe during the mid-nineties but was mainly geared to the treatment of biowaste, due to the fact that source separate collection of the biowaste fraction was being implemented in many countries. The purpose of the source separation at the household level was to be able to achieve a high-quality compost with a very low concentration in heavy metals. In the last 5 years however, the application of anaerobic digestion on residual waste has increased dramatically. In 1998, only 13% of the digestion capacity in Europe was installed for the treatment of residual waste but by 2006, more than 52% of the digestion capacity for MSW was designed to treat residual waste. Current construction of anaerobic digestion plants for MSW is about 2/3 for residual waste and 1/3 for source separated biowaste. The most difficult material to treat is the residual waste that is produced after the separate collection of both recyclables as well as the organics. This means that the easily digestible materials are removed and residual waste with a large degree of impurities, such as glass, stones and plastics, is left over. The purpose of the anaerobic digestion of this residual waste is then mostly to produce an inert stabilized material that can be landfilled in accordance to the German regulations. The oldest digestion plant treating residual waste after separate collection of the biowaste is located in Bassum, Germany, utilizing the Dranco technology.

Partial stream digestion plant in Pohlsche Heide, Hille, Germany

A more recent plant digesting the organic fraction derived from household residual waste, is the plant in Pohlsche Heide, Hille, constructed in 2005. The plant is designed to handle 100.000 t/year, of which 37.500 t/y are anaerobically digested. The plant treats both industrial waste and residual MSW, as well as dewatered sludge coming from wastewater treatment plants in the area surrounding the plant. Only the organics from the residual MSW and the sludge are subjected to digestion (see Figure 1). The residual MSW is first shredded and screened over a rotating sieve of 60 and 300 mm. After removal of the ferrous metals, the fraction less than 60 mm is sent to a ballistic separator. The ballistic separator removes the heavies, such as glass, stones etc, present in this fraction. The heavy components are sent directly to the composting phase. The refined organic fraction after removal of the heavies is subsequently conveyed to a metering bin, in order to meter out the material in the right proportion during feeding of the digester. A part of the organics is diverted without being digested and is mixed with the digestate coming from the digester. The other part of the organics is fed to the mixing-feeding unit of the digester, in

which one part of fresh organics is intensively mixed with around six to eight parts of digestate. Iron chloride and process water are added as needed. A tonnage of 50 to 100 ton per week of sludge is added to the mixture as well, together with the steam necessary to raise the temperature to around 50 C in order to ob tain thermophilic operating conditions. The mixture is pumped by means of a piston pump to the top of the digester, where the mixture starts to ferment immediately.

Municipal solid waste

Industrial waste

SHREDDER

SHREDDER

Biogas

GAS STORAGE

GAS COOLING

ROTATING SIEVE (60/300 mm)

Fraction 60-300 mm Fraction > 300 mm

MAGNET GAS BLOWERS To intermediate storage DRANCO DIGESTER SILOXANE ADSORBER

MAGNET

Fraction < 60 mm

2.260 m Landfill
Heavy parts

MAGNET Sewage sludge AIR SEPARATOR

Light parts

Steam

STEAM GENERATOR

NON-FERROUS SEPARATOR

BALLISTIC SEPARATOR
Hard materials

DOSING UNIT

FEEDING PUMP

GAS ENGINE

To intermediate storage

SHREDDER

Process water

Existing flare

INCINERATION PLANT

MIXING UNIT

RTO

INTENSIVE COMPOSTING

COMPOSTING

Landfill

Figure 1: Flow sheet partial stream Dranco digestion plant in Pohlsche Heide, Germany

The digester has a volume of 2260 m, with a total height of 25m. The residence time in the digester is 21 days on average. The biogas produced is extracted from the top of the digester, while the digesting material moves from top to bottom through the digester by means of gravity only. The digestion tank is not mixed and does not contain any moving devices. The digested material is extracted from the conical bottom of the digester by means of screws and is either recycled to the mixing-pumping unit for the addition of fresh feedstock into the digester, or is removed from the process and sent to a second mixing unit prior to the composting phase. Bypassed non-digested organics are mixed with digestate in a ratio of 1:2 and subjected to an intensive composting phase in heated tunnels. After the intensive composting for 2 to 3 days, the material is moved to non-heated tunnels and is further stabilized and dried. The final end product is sufficiently stabile to meet the standards for inert landfilling, as specified by German law.

The biogas produced is collected at the top of the digester and stored for a brief time in a gas storage. The biogas is further cooled down and pushed through an activated carbon scrubber, in order to remove siloxanes. The cleaned biogas is utilized either for the production of steam, for the production of electricity in gasengines or for the RTO-unit (Regenerative Thermal Oxidation) for the burning of the most polluted process air (see Figure 2).

Fresh air

DELIVERY Hall + point source

Fresh air

PRETREATMENT Hall + point source

DUST FILTER AIR HUMIDIFIER

BIOFILTER

Fresh air

DIGESTION Hall Point source

CHIMNEY

RTO

Biogas

Fresh air

COMPOSTING Tunnel filling hall Tunnel

ACID WASHER H2SO4

Ammonium sulphate

Figure 2: Air flow diagram

Digestion process and results

The feedstock after pretreatment of the residual household waste amounts to about 500 t per week. The material has a high dry matter content (54% DM) and a volatile solids content of 55% (Table 1). The sludge that is added contains about 21% of dry matter with a volatile solids concentration of 61%. The digestion results in the production of 120Nm of biogas per ton of organics derived from residual waste and 23,5 Nm per ton of sludge. The biogas has a methane concentration of 56,2% on average.

Table 1: Composition of organics after pretreatment On fresh weight Dry matter on fresh weight Inerts 9,7 % 94 % Plastics 4,6 % 74 % Textiles 1% 57 % Rest 84,7 % 54 %

Ash content of dry matter 94,8 % 26,4 % 21,2 % 44,6 %

Figures 3, 4 and 5 show an overview of the results obtained during the weeks 34 through 43. Figure 3 shows the tonnage fed during each week. During week 39, the digester was fed during 3 days only, due to maintenance works in the pretreatment. The biogas yield per ton fluctuated only very slightly during this 10-week period. Figure 4 shows the weekly tonnage of organic waste and sludge. The sludge represented on average about 10% of the feed, but rose to 25% during the week that organics were only pretreated during 3 days. Figure 5 shows the biogas production per week in Nm, which averaged around 55.000 Nm and a specific productivity of 4,5 Nm per Nm of active reactor volume and per day.

INPUT IN REACTOR & BIOGAS PRODUCTION

-DRANCO PLANT POHLSCHE HEIDE700 600 500 400 300 200 100 0 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 140 120 100 80 60 40 20 0

Nm/Mg eq. waste

Tons

Week (2006) Total reactor input Biogas production

Figure 3

INPUT IN THE REACTOR

-DRANCO PLANT POHLSCHE HEIDE600 150

500

125

Tons of municipal solid wastel

400

100

Tons of sludge

300

75

200

50

100

25

0 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43

Week (2006) Input municipal solid waste in reactor Input sludge in reactor

Figure 4

BIOGAS PRODUCTION PER WEEK & BIOGAS PRODUCTIVITY

-DRANCO PLANT POHLSCHE HEIDE70.000 60.000 50.000 7 6 5

Nm/mreactor.day

Nm/Week

40.000 30.000 20.000 10.000 0 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43

4 3 2 1 0

Week (2006) Biogas production Biogas productivity

Figure 5

Stabilized end product

Anaerobic digestion of part of the organic fraction allows for a reduced composting time for reaching the stability standards set for stabilized compost. Organics that have not been digested anaerobically require a composting time in the tunnels of 8 to 10 weeks, while the mixture of 2 parts digestate and 1 part of fresh organics needs only 4 to 6 weeks. This means that not only energy is produced during digestion, but also a considerable decrease of tunnel capacity is obtained and the concomitant energy needed to aerate those extra tunnels for an additional 4 to 6 weeks is reduced. All stability parameters were met during the commissioning testing. Samples were analyzed on each 2000 tons treated, equivalent to a complete analysis every 4 weeks (see Table 2).

Table 2: Stability measurements Stability Standard < 35 < 18 < 300 < 5,0 < 20,0 < 6000 Range of medians 25 28 69 71 12 17 150 - 230 1,8 2,6 3,7 3,9 4850 - 4900 Average of medians 26,5 70 14,4 185 2,2 3,8 4875

Water content Ash content TOC in dry residue TOC in eluate Respirometry Gas Production Calorific Value

% % % DM mg/l DM mg O/g DM Nl/kg DM kJ/kg DM

Conclusions
The partial anaerobic digestion of residual MSW significantly reduces investment as well as operating costs for the subsequent aerobic composting and stabilization phase. At the same time, the benefits of anaerobic digestion, such as energy production, reduction of odors and space requirements are obtained for two thirds of the organics produced in the pretreatment. By using a dry fermentation system, which can produce a digestate with a total solids concentration of more than 35%, the need for dewatering together with the treatment of excess wastewater is completely omitted.

References
1. De Baere L. and Boelens J. (1999) The treatment of grey and mixed solid waste by means of anaerobic digestion : future developments. In: presentations (volume II) of Il International symposium on anaerobic digestion of solid waste, Barcelona, Spain. 2. De Baere L. (2005) Will anaerobic digestion of solid waste survive in the future? In: Water Science & Technology Vol. 53, N 8 pp 187 194