Waste incineration—New ways to reduce emission

Waste incineration—New ways to reduce emission

1 86 Reports and reviews and phenomena . The section has failed to provide the reader with a general introduction to the topics and a follow up w...

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1 86

Reports and reviews

and phenomena . The section has failed to provide the reader with a general introduction to the topics and a follow up with case stories . Despite this, several papers are outstanding contributions . The papers in the book are generally well written and edited, so the formal prerequisite for a readable book is present . Unfortunately, many authors have not been careful enough in preparing their tables and illustrations ; part of the explanatory text is hardly readable . Considered as a whole, this book gives a comprehensive survey of aspects of urban pollution, ranging from the administrative and regulatory point of view to the ecological and technical area . The urban environmental problems in the Asian countries and the transfer of knowledge from the Western, industrialized countries are emphasized in many papers . The book provides the reader with a good knowledge of the needs and possibilities for transferring planning, management and technological principles from industrial to developing countries . In addition, mainly well known and fundamental scientific and technological knowledge is referred to . The book is strongly recommended to urban-pollution control planners in any country who wish to widen their knowledge of the general aspects of urban and industrial pollution with specific attention to the relations between industrial and developing countries . Readers, who just seek knowledge on more specific scientific and technological subjects on urban pollution will probably find the book too diverse .

REPORT : WASTE INCINERATION-NEW WAYS TO REDUCE EMISSION . Proceedings of a symposium in Stockholm, September 1986 . Copies of preprints of 16 papers are available from Eva Mittermaier, IVA, Box 5073, S-10242 Stockholm, Sweden . Price 175 SEK . Reviewed by Eva Mittermaier . This two-day Swedish-German symposium was arranged by the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences in co-operation with the Swedish Association of Public Cleansing and Solid Waste Management, the Verein Deutscher Ingenieure-Gesellschaft Energietechnik and Sweden's National Energy Administration . Results from different cleaning methods in the two countries were presented, as well as the latest developments in the field of waste incineration (4 papers) . During the last couple of years, techniques for better waste incineration have been considerably developed, thus contributing to a less polluted environment . Leading techniques are being developed in Sweden and West Germany, where laws and regulations push towards decreased limit values for emissions of, for example, heavy metals . Energy optimizations in Sweden also lead to a cleaning procedure, where energy can be saved by condensing the flue gas in a wet cleaning system (3 papers) . In West Germany, the air pollution regulation "TA Luft 86" limits the permissible emissions with flue gases from industrial plants, to a few percent of today's value . For example, for mercury and cadmium, the limits will be 0 .2 mg per normal cubic meter . As TA Luft 86 applies to both new and old plants, the results of the necessary industrial investments in cleaning techniques should be noticeable in the near future . In Sweden, there is an annual production of about 1 .5 million tons of domestic waste and 4 .5 million tons of industrial waste . In 1986, more than 50% of the domestic waste was incinerated, about 40% was landfilled without pretreatment and the rest was separated or composted . The energy produced in waste incineration is utilized mainly for supplying district heating . In 1985, 2 .5 TWh of energy were produced in



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this way . The income from sales of energy thus reduces the costs of building and running the waste-incineration plants . In February 1985, a moratorium on the construction of new waste-incineration plants in Sweden was imposed . The reason for this was the discovery of dioxine emissions from incineration plants . The problems of outlets of dioxine, heavy metals, hydrochloric acid, etc ., have been investigated during the period September 1985-June 1986 by Sweden's Energy Administration and the Swedish National Environmental Protection Board . The investigation, called "Energy from Refuse", indicates very tough conditions for the future incineration of solid waste in Sweden . Installations of advanced gas cleaning systems will be necessary due to the new guidelines for outlets from incineration plants . Optimized incineration and improved education for the staff at the plants are other important factors . At the symposium, several cleaning systems were presented . The Fläkt Industri AB, Götaverken Energy Systems, Andeze and Fagersta Energetics from Sweden presented their different flue gas cleaning systems . The Von Roll system, Switzerland and the LAB-system from SGP, Austria were also represented . The problem of waste water treatment was discussed, with examples from Germany and Sweden .

BOOK REVIEW : TOXIC AND HAZARDOUS WASTES-PROCEEDINGS OF THE SEVENTEENTH MID-ATLANTIC INDUSTRIAL WASTE CONFERENCE . 23-25 JUNE 1985 . Edited by Irwin J . Kugelman . Published by Technomic Publishing Co . Inc ., USA . 857 pp. $49.00 (soft cover) . Reviewed by R . McFarland, Maunsell & Partners, Pty Ltd, Sydney, Australia. These proceedings are the compilation of 46 technical papers which embraced the 10 sessions of the 17th Mid-Atlantic Industrial Waste Conference, which were : biological treatment, pretreatments, physical-chemical treatment, groundwater tracing and modelling, land application and liner technology, resource recovery, hazardous waste, metals and industrial waste, sludge management and safety and right-to-know . The proceedings open with a paper addressing the problems of the siting of new hazardous-waste facilities which highlights the ever increasing difficulties associated with gaining approval for such sites . The number of available registered sites continues to decline while the waste-generation rates continue to increase . The paper concludes by stating that public education is the key to successful siting, recommending that the public must be convinced that new facilities under new laws are safe, that the media conditioning that such facilities are prone to disaster must be broken, and that the public must be actively encouraged to participate in the siting process . Although these concepts are not new, their presentation is concise and hones in on points for future action . In the 10 technical sessions, papers range from the wildly theoretical (the use of a pure chemical waste stream under constant laboratory conditions) to the directly applicable (the use of water treatment sludge for lime lining of landfills) . An unfortunate limitation of these proceedings is the general lack of abstracts, thereby making accessibility to the specific and detailed information very limited . While some of my colleagues believe it beneficial to wade through the related disciplines' information, my personal preference is for the collection of abstracts into a section preceding the papers enabling me to choose the information relevant to my interests .