Proceedings of the International Conference on Sustainable Solid Waste Management, 5 - 7 September 2007, Chennai, India. pp.

385-392

Energy from Waste by Pyrolysis and Gasification the Experience and Performance of an Operational Plant
Richard Hogg
Compact Power Limited, Avonmouth, Bristol, BS11 9HZ ABSTRACT Compact Power has developed an advanced thermal conversion technology based on pyrolysis, gasification and high temperature oxidation. It provides an economic and effective energy recovery process for a wide range of materials, recovers up to 80% of the energy value of the waste fuel as usable heat and power, and operates to the highest environmental standards. The technology has been developed over a period of 9 years and is now being demonstrated in a commercial plant which has been running in Avonmouth in Bristol, UK for the last 5 years, of which 4 years have been under an Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control Authorisation which is the first and still the only authorization granted by the Environment Agency for an operational advanced thermal conversion technology in the UK. . Results show that operations are well within permitted limits and in some respects new standards are being demonstrated. Compact Power has with QinetiQ developed a small scale waste reduction unit for use by The Royal Navy. This plant has completed land based commissioning trials and one will shortly be installed in a ship. The company is developing land-based derivatives of this plant that will be ideal for on-site waste management and heat provision. In the biomass field our strategy is to develop small high efficiency plant that can handle a wide range of fuels. The gases and char produced through pyrolysis will be used to power gas turbines. An alliance has been announced with TurboGenset and Hiflux to develop this process which will be ideal for distributed power generation. It is expected that the first plant will be operating before the end of 2006. 1.0 INTRODUCTION Compact Power was established in 1992 by Nic Cooper and Professor John Sharpe, an expert on thermal power plant. It started as a clean coal combustion technology providing an alternative to the medium speed diesel engine for industrial applications. The founders then identified a niche in the market for waste-to-energy plant, appropriately engineered to provide economic answers for biomass and local integrated waste management with minimal environmental impact. It is based on a modular concept to give the flexibility to match the variable requirements of truly sustainable solutions.

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Energy from Waste by Pyrolysis and Gasification the Experience and Performance of an Operational Plant

The Companys proprietary technology for processing a wide range of wastes uses the processes of pyrolysis, gasification and high temperature oxidation. Through these processes the highest relevant environmental standards are achieved. The high level of energy recovery in the form of heat and power enables the technology to support complementary processes and promote job creation at local level. A full scale prototype plant was built in 1994 based on a single pyrolyser tube with a throughput capacity of 3,000 tonnes a year; and between 1994 and 1997 a series of trials were conducted on a variety of wastes, including dewatered sewage sludge, MSW, clinical waste, waste from vegetable oil refining, tyre crumb, and coal slurry. These tested the core thermo-chemical processes and provided data on the performance of the plant and on emissions and solid residues. The results showed that the emissions fell within or close to all relevant standards without any air pollution control equipment and that the plant could achieve the highest environmental standards with minimum conventional flue-gas remediation. Subsequently a commercial plant has been built at Avonmouth in Bristol with double the throughput capacity. Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control Authorisation (IPPC) was obtained from the Environment Agency in October 2001. Since then the plant has been taking clinical, pharmaceutical and confidential waste demonstrating the performance of the plant in normal commercial operating conditions. Trials on other waste streams have also been successful. These include: RDF, MSW, paper mill waste, tannery waste, food, sewage sludge, and auto shredder residue. The company is also pursuing further technology developments with the object of creating applications for the re-processing of waste materials to create useful, and in some cases high value, industrial products. Currently the particular focus is on the production of activated carbon, carbon black and building materials from ash. Derivatives of the core process have also been developed to handle shipboard waste and to produce heat and power from biomass. 2.0 THE TECHNOLOGY Compact Power combines the thermo-chemical processes of pyrolysis, gasification and high temperature oxidation. The process diagram presented in Figure 1 outlines the details. 2.1 Ash Recycling Compact Power has a development programme for optimising the use of suitable ash in the production of lightweight aggregate and other building materials. 3.0 PLANT DESIGN Compact Powers designs are based on the principle of compact, modular units of plant that are used to produce integrated systems for waste to energy and CHP applications ( Figure 2).

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Feed Preparation
materials recovery Boiler WAS TE cyclonic separator part iculat es >10 microns bypass damper Sodium Bicarbonate

Pyrolysis

Gasification

Oxidation

Ene rgy Recovery

Flue Gas Clean Up

Bag Filter

compacting air lock

Condenser

T urbine

Ammonia

1250C
DeNOx Catalyst Electricity

Heat Stack

air steam air carbon recycling bottom ash Fuel (warm-up only)

Figure 1 Process Diagram of Compact Power Technology

4.0 THE AVONMOUTH 1 WASTE TO ENERGY PLANT 4.1 Background The Avonmouth 1 plant is our first commercial facility and has now been operating successfully for over five years. It thermally processes mainly high grade clinical and pharmaceutical waste and provides the heat energy for two Tempico rotaclaves that process the lower grade clinical waste that does not require high temperature treatment. 4.2 Availability and Throughput Data The overall data are presented in Table 1.
Table 1. Overall Data Related to the Project

Mechanical Availabilty for 44 months of operation Annual Operational equivalent Average Monthly throughput for the period Annual equivalent Hourly Throughput Equivalent Proportion of Thermal Occupancy (assumed CV 22 MJ/kg)

69.14 % 6056 hrs 162 Tonnes per month 1948 Tonnes per year 330 kg/hr 61%

Please note, when examining the plot, that the figures have been averaged over 3 months, to include the months preceding and following the data point. This has been done in order to provide a clearer 387

Energy from Waste by Pyrolysis and Gasification the Experience and Performance of an Operational Plant

picture, iron out some of the variability, and allow a closer examination of the trends. It does, however, mean that each data point is affected by the next months data, and so changes in trends seem to occur before they actually did. 4.3 Data Analysis The figures below are the statistics for the commercial operation of the Avonmouth facility, starting from the first calendar year after the plant was granted its IPPC license. The plant has operated almost entirely on clinical and pharmaceutical waste over this whole period, except for one two-week trial, in June 2002 (other trials at 24 hrs or less are ignored as they do not substantially affect the data). The data point for this period is obvious on the graph, being the only point when the throughput line overtakes the availability plot. In this 2-week period, over 200 Tonnes of RDF was processed at an average of approximately 600 kg/hr. No allowances have been made for the fact that in 2002 the plant was a new technology. Also, no allowance has been made for the downtime for improvements to the plant to optimise the process, its performance and availability. These figures therefore include three annual major shutdowns, including a very long (7 week) shutdown in 2002, principally to upgrade the refractory from wool to cast and brick. It also includes the 2003, 2004 and 2005 planned shutdowns. Other shorter shutdowns are undertaken quarterly, and so it is unlikely that their impact is so obvious, as each data point contains a month in which a shutdown occurred. The planned shutdown regime is being revised at the moment, with a likelihood of reducing to two shutdowns per year, on a six-month cycle. There was a significant change in the feedstock for the plant in March 2004, which coincides with the opening of the adjacent sterilisation facility. This change is marked with a line on the graph. At this time, the lower grades of waste, which are heavier and easier to process, were removed from the waste stream, leaving lighter, and more challenging waste to process. These grades mostly consist of rigid plastic sharps containers, and pharmaceuticals. One particular aspect of this change is that the waste now includes a lot of wire, in long lengths, seemingly from bowden cables used in endoscopic surgical procedures. These lengths, over a metre long, are prone to balling up into nests, if they are introduced in significant quantities at one time. This event can cause difficulties in the ash system. This alone has been responsible for over 15% of mechanical downtime since the waste change. Procedures have been introduced to cope with this and on future plants the ash handling system will be modified. Such material is present, in such concentrations, in any other waste. Throughput had been rising to March 2004, and had reached the level of a regular availability over 70% and throughput over 210 tonnes per month. It dipped after this date to approximately 50% of its value before the change. This drop is entirely due to differences and difficulties with the waste and residue handling aspects at the feed and ash end of the plant. Since the first months, throughput has progressively increased to over 75% of the former value, and it is still rising, with the average for the last 7 months at over 170 tonnes per month.

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It must be recognised that despite the drop in throughput, gate fees for the higher grades are more than double the lower grades, making this an economic improvement, even with lower throughput. 5.0 CONCLUSIONS These figures track the performance of a new technology (in 2002) being thrust into a commercial environment, whilst still being optimised and improved. Developments to the plant, undertaken over this period that help improve plant performance include: Pyrolysis tube life and reliability has been improved 300% Feed system energy use has dropped by 60% Bicarbonate usage has been reduced 70% with no drop in environmental performance Refractory trials have identified cheaper and longer-lasting alternatives for all areas of the plant Demonstration trials have been undertaken with abattoir waste, tyres, car shredder residue, sewage sludge, tannery wastes, RDF, paper waste and food waste. At the same time, the original design has been validated by the following: Process performance is exactly in line with the design, and no items of plant have been replaced due to insufficient capacity or design margin. No boiler tubes have required replacement (corrosion is traditionally a problem in the waste incineration industry) Emissions are consistently at or below 15% of the permitted concentrations under WID (see below), regardless of the composition of waste processed. However, it must be recognised that the availability does not reach the proposed figure of over 80% for an MT8 plant. There are several contributory reasons for this, the most significant of which are: This plant operates with clinical waste, a very difficult waste, which is not pre-processed in any way. The plant throughput is too small to be able to average the heterogeneous nature of the waste. If each bag or container weighs 3 kg, and the plant averages (as it does) 300 kg/hr, only 100 bags are put in per hour, 12/3 per minute. With the same waste, and a plant 4 times the size, the input is 62/3 bags per minute. This alone guarantees a more representative throughput, and a more even feed, more stable conditions and improved operational characteristics. The availability of the process is dependent on very few components. A single compactor blockage reduces capacity to 50% and an ash system blockage reduces capacity to 0%. In an MT8, a compactor blockage reduces capacity to 87.5%, and an ash system blockage to 75% capacity. This means that even with the same component outage rate, an MT8 is inherently more available than an MT2. The MT2 has very low built in redundancy. 6.0 EMISSIONS The following data is derived from the annual summary reports as provided to the Environment Agency for the years 2004, 2005 and 2006. The annual report summary is provided to give this data. Daily Data The plant uses an ABB Fourier Transform Infra-Red Spectroscopy Unit, couple with an 389

Energy from Waste by Pyrolysis and Gasification the Experience and Performance of an Operational Plant

FID for VOCs and a PCME Particulate Monitor, to report all emissions. This plant is recalibrated every 6 months, and calibration records indicate that no readings have been further than 5% from actual readings over the life of the plant. All readings are therefore considered accurate. Average emission statistics for the entire three-year period is presented in Table 2.
Table 2. Average Emission Statistics for Three Year Period
Determinand Unit WID Limit Value Compact Power Performance 2004 - 2006 1.41 0.96 0.12 3.88 21.26 0.26 1.40 0.74 Percentage of Limit Value

NH3 HCl HF CO NOx (NO 2 + NO as NO 2) VOCs Particulate SO2

mg/m3 mg/m3 mg/m3 mg/m3 mg/m3 mg/m3 mg/m3 mg/m3

10 10 1 50 200 10 10 50

14.1% 9.6% 12.1% 7.8% 10.6% 2.6% 14.0% 1.5%

All Values Corrected to STP, 11%O 2, dry

Emissions Exceedances In three years, a total of 52,000 half-hour periods, the following periods of emissions higher than WID have occurred. CO HCl Particulates Ammonia 28 Half-hours 7 Half-hours 4 Half-hours 1 Half-hour 0.05% of the period 0.013% of the period 0.007% of the period 0.002% of the period

Totalling these together, the plant has been fully compliant with WID for 99.928% of these three years. Not one daily exceedance has occurred. 7.0 ENERGY RECLAMATION The Avonmouth plant is equipped with a small turbine, to generate electricity. However, this is not now normally used because the steam from the boiler is used to power the sterilisers, offsetting fuel consumption. Compact Power does not generate long-term averaging data for energy reclamation preferring to examine a single representative days operation. One such study, reported to the Environment Agency, was undertaken on 14th April 2005. The findings were as follows: Energy Input in Waste Heat losses to Pyrolyser

2446kW 391kW

100% 16% 390

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Heat loss to Stack 404kW Energy to Steam (Thermal Capture Efficiency) 1650kW Energy to Sterilisation Plant 700kW Parasitic Use 500kW Heat Rejected 450kW 27.5% of steam

16.5% 67.7% 42.5% of steam 30% of steam

The important criteria for predicting use in an MT8 is the Thermal Capture Efficiency, at 67.7%. This is short of the projected capture in the MT8, which we assume to be 75%. The difference is due to the thermal economies of scale. A larger plant has a relatively small surface area, and therefore losses. It is not unreasonable therefore to assume an improvement of 10% on thermal capture, when the plant handles 400% more energy. Compared with a typical mass burn incinerator, the system has very low environmental impact in terms of air pollution and discharges of residues to land. There is no aqueous waste effluent and the plant has a low visual impact compared with a typical mass burn incinerator.
Table 3. Emissions from RDF Trial Compact Power Avonmouth June 2002

Dust/particulates Volatile Organic Compounds Hydrogen Chloride Hydrogen Fluoride Sulphur Dioxide Oxides of Nitrogen Cd + Tl NH3 Pb+Cr+Cu+Mn+Ni+As+Sb+Co+V Dioxins + Furans (ng/Nm3) Carbon Monoxide 8.0 FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS

Waste Incineration Directive limits (mg/Nm3) 10 10 10 1 50 200 0.05 10 0.5 0.1 50

Compact Power levels (mg/Nm3) 2.1 0.34 0.91 <0.1 0.34 30.3 0.006 0.29 0.006 <0.003 1.45

Percentage of WID limit 21% 3% 9% <10% 1% 15% 12% 3% 1% <3% 3%

Having successfully demonstrated the core technology Compact Power now wishes to exploit it to full commercial advantage. The following developments are now in progress: The construction and demonstration of the first MT8 full scale MSW plant in conjunction with Bristol City Council at Avonmouth to be operational in autumn 2008. Installation of the successful ST150 (Marine Pyrolysis Unit) in HMS Ocean. Development of the land version of ST150 with full gas clean up and CHP unit for small scale use

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Energy from Waste by Pyrolysis and Gasification the Experience and Performance of an Operational Plant

The development of a biomass distributed generation plant (BDG) for the provision of high efficiency CHP utilising gas turbines and power electronics. Pilot plant expected to be operational in 2006. An alliance with TurboGenset and Hiflux has already been announced in this regard. The construction and demonstration of the technology as primary gas fuel suppliers for kilns.

Plant throughput & Availability Jan '02 - May '05

100.00% 90.00% 80.00% 70.00% 60.00% 50.00% 40.00% 30.00% 20.00% 10.00% 0.00% 300.00 240.00 180.00 120.00 60.00
January February March April May June July August September October November December January February March April May June July August September October November December January February March April May June July August September October November December January February March April May 2002 2003 2004 2005

0.00

Rolling Quarter Availability Average

Rolling Quarter Throughput Average

Figure 3

9.0 CONCLUSION Compact Power is through the operation of its plants over the last ten years one of the world leaders in the development and operation of pyrolysis plant. The process proved itself at commercial scale and has been refined to the point that the company is now confident of being major player in the municipal and industrial waste management market providing an alternative to traditional waste incineration that is economically viable and environmentally acceptable.

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