WatchfulEye wrote:Is it really you? We've missed you.
WatchfulEye wrote:Anyway, we've got a similar system where I live. All the local landfill sites are full, and a local energy recovery facility has been built.
dohboi wrote:Burning trash for energy (or for any other reason) is generally a very bad idea. There are generally lots of toxic heavy metals that end up in the air and in the extremely toxic ash, which then needs to be somehow safely disposed of. Particulates released into the air are generally quite high, especially the very small micro particles that get deepest into people's lungs and cause asthma and other nasty problems.
Why the great urge to burn everything? Burning stuff is what got us into this mess. We need to massively REDUCE the amount of trash we generate, and burning it, among other things, lulls us into the false notion that we can keep on generating trash because it will "go away" when we burn it, and give us a nice treat of extra electricity for our ipods.
There is a huge literature on how bad an idea this is, but that hasn't stopped lots of projects like this from going through.
Landfills subject to the rule are expected to collect at least 75 percent of the gas produced by the landfill. The collected landfill gas must be combusted at a high enough temperature to destroy 98 percent of the toxics.
Devil wrote:Did you even read the link? Switzerland has extremely severe limits on all pollutants and, as stated, all of these, except NOx, are kept to about 1/10th of these severe limits in the plant. NOx is maintained at about half the limit value. You can see the actual figures, measured by an independent authority, on the Tridel site, if you read French. The days of dirty trash burning were 20th century; we are now in the 21st century. Please go back and read it up.
Furthermore, the solid waste stream is 1/10th the volume of compacted garbage: would you prefer that waste goes into huge, smelly, rat-infested, noisome landfills, where it emits greenhouse-gas methane to further climate change? Don't be ridiculous!
dohboi wrote:I read the link. I'm a skeptic. You obviously aren't. And you don't seem to have read my post. We need to massively reduce the amount of trash we generate, and recylce and compost what is left.
Devil wrote:dohboi wrote:Burning trash for energy (or for any other reason) is generally a very bad idea. There are generally lots of toxic heavy metals that end up in the air and in the extremely toxic ash, which then needs to be somehow safely disposed of. Particulates released into the air are generally quite high, especially the very small micro particles that get deepest into people's lungs and cause asthma and other nasty problems.
Why the great urge to burn everything? Burning stuff is what got us into this mess. We need to massively REDUCE the amount of trash we generate, and burning it, among other things, lulls us into the false notion that we can keep on generating trash because it will "go away" when we burn it, and give us a nice treat of extra electricity for our ipods.
There is a huge literature on how bad an idea this is, but that hasn't stopped lots of projects like this from going through.
Did you even read the link? Switzerland has extremely severe limits on all pollutants and, as stated, all of these, except NOx, are kept to about 1/10th of these severe limits in the plant. NOx is maintained at about half the limit value. You can see the actual figures, measured by an independent authority, on the Tridel site, if you read French. The days of dirty trash burning were 20th century; we are now in the 21st century. Please go back and read it up.
Furthermore, the solid waste stream is 1/10th the volume of compacted garbage: would you prefer that waste goes into huge, smelly, rat-infested, noisome landfills, where it emits greenhouse-gas methane to further climate change? Don't be ridiculous!
dohboi wrote:Why the great urge to burn everything?
zensui wrote:why not use the methane for energy? trash does not need to be burned...
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