A tool to help calculate renewable energy outputs from waste materials is set to optimise recovery processes at energy-from-waste (EfW) plants.
Cranfield University has developed a new approach for calculating the potential amount of energy that could be extracted from various waste streams, prior to incineration.
In order to work out the renewable (or biogenic) content of waste, two approaches are currently taken.
The first, manual sorting of waste into its individual components, is not only time consuming but costly and carries certain health and safety concerns. The second, which analyses the flue gas using specialist equipment for carbon dating, is also costly and can only be calculated retrospectively.
This new method from Cranfield uses an image analysis tool alongside microwave analysis. When placed above a conveyor belt in a waste treatment facility, it determines the composition of mixed waste streams and subsequently calculates how much renewable energy is derived from each individual component.
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