Today we visited a waste management plant operated by VillaService S.p.A. Here, they have 3 landfills; one is closed, one is about a year out from being filled, and the last one is being prepared to accept waste. Biogas is collected from these landfills and is burned to create energy and lower methane emissions. The plant also has a water treatment facility that collects the leachate from the landfills so that it can be used in a process called anaerobic digestion.
Anaerobic digestion involves taking organic waste and introducing microbes to it. These microbes consume the waste and produce a biogas as a result. This process it similar to what occurs in a landfill, but it happens much faster. Like in a landfill, this gas is collected and used to drive electric generators. After this process, the leftover is put into a landfill rather than used for composting because it takes on a glue like consistency and cannot be processed. That being said, the plant does also conduct composting. The process used is similar to the one used at the previous composting sight we visited.
Despite the overwhelming odor that was only intensified by the hot weather, it was interesting to see how waste can be processed and used to create energy. The anaerobic plant produced 2,263,623 kWh of electricity in 2013, while the landfill produced 28,844 kWh. The amount of electricity that was transferred to the network from these two plants was 638,089 kWh and 1,138 kWh respectively. Similar to the last landfill we visited, this site also contained solar panels. A concept has been introduced that would involve solar panels being placed on top of the closed landfill to maximize space efficiency.
Sorry for the somewhat dry post, I have other business to attend to! Have a nice morning/day/evening/night! (depending on what time you read this)
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