Displaying items by tag: Alternative Fuels

Poland: Gorazdze Cement intends to cut costs partly by increasing its usage of alternative fuels, according to its CEO Ernest Jelito. As the Polish cement producer is currently operating at a 60 – 70% capacity utilisation rate it has no plans to increase its capacity. Gorazdze Cement has a thermal substitution rate of around 50% at present and it intends to raise this to 70 – 80%.

US: The Indiana Department of Environmental Management will hold a public hearing about the use of liquid waste-derived fuel at the Essroc Cement Speed plant. Essroc Cement is applying for a state environmental permit to burn liquid waste-derived fuel in one of its cement kilns in the unincorporated Clark County community of Speed. Residents have expressed concerns about the plants. No date for the meeting has been set, according to Associated Press.

Mike McHugh, the Speed plant's director, said Essroc plans to use products mostly from the petroleum industry, such as paint thinners, antifreeze and acetone. The plant will have to build two small storage facilities for it to start replacing about 25 – 30% of the coal it burns with liquid waste-derived fuel.

Essroc Corporate Environmental Engineer Luis Rodriguez said the company welcomes the public's questions. The company hosted an open house and talked with community leaders in 2014 before it submitted its application. "We actually want it to go to public comment so we can answer some of these questions... We've wanted to be as upfront on this as possible," said Rodriguez.

Ecuador: Hormicreto has ordered two calciner burners and a hot gas generator for its swing mill application, for alternative liquid fuels firing, with a thermal capacity of 5.2MW, including the complete the fuel pumping, heating and valve train, from FCT Combustion for its cement plant in Cuenca, Ecuador.

UK: Wastecycle's recycling facility in Colwick, Nottinghamshire is now one of the largest in the UK after an expansion of the site. By acquiring seven acres of property, which the company previously leased, and buying an additional four acres, Wastecycle has extended its site to nearly 20 acres.

"It's an exciting time for us because this expansion provides us with the platform we need to reach the next stage of growth as a company," said Financial Director Nathan Cole. "Over the long term, we plan to use the additional land to expand our extensive recycling and resource management activities. This will help us broaden the services we offer our customers while improving the quality and sustainability of the recycled products we manufacture."

The company has also completed an expansion of its main office to accommodate its growing workforce. After a 20% growth in staff 2015, it now employs almost 300 people across its Colwick site and its two sites in Leicestershire. "Ensuring our teams are comfortable in their working environments is very important to us because, not only does it increase productivity, but it also creates positive morale," said Cole. "Larger premises also provide the opportunity to open up new jobs, while improving the quality of service we can provide to customers."

Wastecycle separates 500,000t/yr of waste, including 18,000t/yr of recycling from 126,131 homes in the Nottingham City Council area. Some of the waste is turned into refuse-derived fuel (RDF) for use at cement plants. It also sorts through the rubbish of thousands of businesses across Nottinghamshire, runs a skip hire service and operates a wallboard recycling facility, which it developed with British Gypsum.

In 2014, Wastecycle's turnover increased to Euro42.8m from Euro35.9m in 2013. In 2015, it won four awards, including a bronze environmental best practice accolade at the Green Apple Awards in November 2015. It was recognised for the success of its wallboard recycling scheme, which has prevented more than 30,000t/yr of wallboard from reaching landfill.

Ireland: Irish Cement will burn used tyres in a bid to cut costs and secure jobs at its Limerick plant. The company plans to switch to dry waste material such as rubber from used tyres and plastic to heat the kiln at the plant. The switch will cut costs, make the plant cleaner and more competitive, according to the company.

A spokesman for Irish Cement said that the company would shortly be lodging a planning application with Limerick City and County Council for the replacement of fossil fuels with alternative fuels and raw materials to improve the sustainability of their operations. The company will also be seeking a revision of its licence from the Environmental Protection Agency.

"Limerick is Ireland's oldest cement plant, having commenced operations 77 years ago. Its continuous operation has been sustained by continuous investment in new technologies and processes. After the recent period of reduced demand, production is once again on the increase at home and abroad for cement. This fuel replacement programme will be key to sustaining this growth," said Plant Manager Pat Robinson. "Based on experience in other cement plants in Ireland and throughout Europe, the opportunity to reduce our dependence on imported fossil fuels will prove critical to our ability to operate competitively and sustain jobs at Irish Cement Limerick into the future."

China: Eleven people have been detained in Yangchun, south China's Guangdong Province, after demonstrations against a project to build a waste incinerator adjacent to a cement plant turned violent.

Protesters said the demonstrations drew hundreds of people agitated over the risk of pollution from the project."How will we survive breathing in noxious smoke?" said one of the protestors.

Tension persisted for two days, with protesters saying that hundreds of people had been gathering near the gates of the cement plant.

Vietnam: Holcim is using shoes as an alternative fuel in Vientam thanks to its new solid recovered fuel (SRF) plant from shredding specialist Untha, according to Equipment World.

The new SRF plant will use waste from Vietnam's largest shoe factory once it has been delivered. It was pre-assembled and tested in Austria and is currently being shipped by sea to Holcim in Vietnam. Delivery is expected in September 2015. The SRF plant will convert the waste by using an anti-explosive Atex-specification XR3000 Cutter waste shredder with two 113kW motors, conveyor, over-band magnet, control room and water-powered fire suppression technology. The plant can process 10t of material into the 8mm, high calorific value fuel.

UK: Axion Polymers has invested significantly in new laboratory and testing facilities to ensure consistent quality of its solid recovered fuel (SRF) products and to satisfy the stringent standards of its technical end markets.

It has installed a laboratory-scale furnace at its large-scale processing facility, Shredder Waste Advanced Processing Plant (SWAPP), in Trafford Park, Manchester to enhance accurate measurement and testing of the physical and thermal properties of its Axfuel® SRF 30, an alternative fuel used by the cement industry, among others.

Axion has also recruited a quality control team working within ISO 9001 operating procedures to conduct in-house product testing, including analysis on critical aspects such as SRF calorific value and chemical composition. Samples are sent on a weekly basis to external laboratories for further testing and verification.

Derived from automotive shredder residue, Axfuel SRF 30 is a sub 30mm-sized mixture of textiles, fibre-fluff, plastic, foam and rubber, with a gross calorific value of 18 - 22MJ/Kg and available in large tonnages.

"We have made this important investment because alternative fuels from waste need to be treated as a product, not as a waste. If SRF is to deliver the fuel benefit and meet the technically-demanding specifications of our end markets, it has to be of consistently high quality so customers can buy with confidence," said Axion director Roger Morton. "By operating within strict quality controls, we can ensure our reliable supply of SRF is produced to exceptionally high standards. As this fuel is sourced from end-of-life vehicles, giving it a second life as an alternative high-energy feed is going to be an attractive option for companies who want to demonstrate their environmental credentials."

India: The Punjab government has approved a 40MW generation project using solid waste as fuel. The project will be set up by Lahore Waste Management Company (LWMC) and US-based Eco Air will prepare a feasibility study and provide technical assistance, according to Pakistan Engineering Review.

LWMC manager LWMC Wasif Azhar said that the project would help Lahore to dispose of solid waste in a useful way and provide cheap electricity. He hoped that the initiative would attract more investments. The project contract will be awarded on a build, operate and transfer basis.

The project will be set up at a landfill site near Lakho Der, along the River Ravi, to be provided to the investor free of cost. LWMC has signed agreements with DG Khan Cement and Lahore Compost to supply 1000t/day of solid waste for recycling. The companies will segregate the waste into two major components: Burnable and organic. The burnable component will be used as fuel in industrial units, while the organic material will be separated for bio-fertilisers to reduce the use of chemical fertilisers.

Thailand: Executives from 50 administrative bodies in Nakhon Ratchasima Province have discussed how to dispose of 638,060t of accumulated garbage. A report on 'proper and practical methods' for disposal of the rubbish must be sent to the Office of Natural Resources and Environmental Policy and Planning by 30 July 2015.

The Comptroller-General's department has calculated that Nakhon Ratchasima will need US$6.19m in the 2016 fiscal year to dispose of the accumulated trash. Ranongrak Suwanchawee, president of the Nakhon Ratchasima Provincial Administrative Organisation, said that officials had agreed to transport and dispose of the garbage at a TPI Polene cement plant in Saraburi Province. This meant 29,000 trips to carry the trash in trucks plus the digging and levelling of a tip. The organisation has estimated that Nakhon Ratchasima would need a budget of about US$7.33m, slightly more than the department calculated.