Energy from municipal solid wastes: Galati city case study

The municipal solid wastes (MSW) can be turned into resources through recycling and energy recovery. To obtain the maximum amount of energy, the appropriate technology must be applied to waste treatment. The composition and characteristics of municipal solid wastes are determinant for technologies choice for MSW in a city/region. Municipal authorities from the Galati city proposed a recovery rate of recyclable materials of 60% from MSW and treatment of the post-recycling MSW as follow: biodegradable fraction by anaerobic digestion and the combustible fraction by incineration or gasification. In this study traditional and innovative waste to energy technologies have been analysed and the potential of electrical energy of waste has been estimated. Results show that plasma gasification system of raw MSW coupled with gas turbine engine has almost the same electrical energy production (32.92 GWh/year) as conventional gasification of combustible material from MSW (17.21GWh/year) coupled with anaerobic digestion of organic fraction of MSW (11.65 GWh/year). By recovering and using the landfill gas from the Tirighina landfill, 6.68 GWh of electricity can be produced annually.