Key Insights:
There is an increasing need for businesses to reduce their energy demand and to secure energy supply; improve water efficiency; and reduce and beneficiate waste streams. This is the result of crises in energy and water supply and due to reduction in landfill airspace and implementation of landfill bans.
Waste-to-energy solutions are one way that businesses could potentially address these challenges1. Waste-to-energy can, in some cases, reduce waste management and utility requirement costs, as:
• The gate fees of many of these solutions are often cheaper than landfill gate fees.2
• Logistic costs for waste management may be reduced.
• Through beneficiation of on-site waste streams with waste-to-energy solutions, businesses can reduce the amount of waste to landfills, reduce their energy demand from the utility provider’s grid and improve their energy security.
There are technology providers that provide circular economy based services that include a combination of on-site waste management, small scale embedded generation for on-site usage, replacement of fossil based fuels with biofuels, wastewater treatment and water reticulation for reuse.
However, the combination services and the business case for the specific solution offered is dependent on unique needs of the business and the site on which the waste is being generated.
The type of waste generated, and the degree of pre- treatment required, will determine the waste-to-energy solution applicable to one’s business, as well as the investments required for on-site infrastructure to enable efficient implementation of the selected solution.
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