NewsLanc has asked fundamental questions of the Lancaster County Solid Waste Material Authority concerning the advisability of the acquisition of the trouble plagued Harrisburg Incinerator for approximately $150 million. Asking questions is not the same as supporting or opposing. Because of the reluctance of the representative of the Lancaster County Solid Waste Material Authority to respond to the inquiries, NewsLanc will seek information from other sources and report in a series of articles.
Apropo, the LCSWMA web site does an excellent job in explaining their operationIt is apparent that the authority does have experience with incinerators. Below are excerpts of particular interest:
Integrated System: System Overview
When thinking of waste management, one can probably assume that innovation and ingenuity aren’t words which come to mind. But that’s exactly the type of thinking behind LCSWMA’s philosophy in managing Lancaster County’s municipal solid waste. Nationally recognized for its exceptional practices, LCSWMA continually pushes the boundaries of traditional waste management to provide superior service to the residents of Lancaster County.
LCSWMA operates a fully integrated system to manage the municipal solid waste and recyclables generated in Lancaster County in an environmentally safe, reliable, and efficient manner. In order to achieve this goal, LCSWMA employs a multi‐faceted approach that focuses on recycling and hazardous waste management to minimize the volume and toxicity of waste, and then processes the remaining waste using its three primary disposal assets: a state‐of‐the‐art Transfer Station, Waste‐to‐Energy (WTE) Facility and landfill.
With an aggressive recycling program and permanent Household Hazardous Waste Facility, LCSWMA removes 40% of the county’s municipal waste stream upfront. Fifty eight percent (58%) of the remaining waste is processed at LCSWMA’s WTE Facility. The WTE Facility reduces the volume of the waste it processes by 90%, while generating enough electricity to power one in six homes in Lancaster County.
The remaining 2% of the municipal waste stream, the portion of the county’s waste which cannot be recycled or processed to make energy, is disposed of in the Frey Farm Landfill. Through this practice, LCSWMA has extended the life of its current landfill by 19 years, which, in turn, helps preserve open space in the county.
LCSWMA’s commitment to responsible and progressive waste management drives the organization to maximize resource recovery in every aspect of its endeavors. LCSWMA is continuously evaluating its Integrated System to ensure its facilities are designed or upgraded to adhere to the highest standards of environmentally responsible waste management.
Environmentally responsible waste management is not LCSWMA’s only pursuit. Over the past 18 years, LCSWMA has worked to implement a variety of green initiatives, including an impressive renewable energy profile—including a 3.2 MW wind energy project and a 3.2 MW landfill gas-to-energy project located on its Frey Farm Landfill—in an effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and promote green energy use in Lancaster County
Trash has truly become a treasure in Lancaster County!
Understand How Energy-from-Waste Works
Energy-from-Waste (EfW or waste-to-energy) facilities offer a safe, technologically advanced means of waste disposal while also generating clean, renewable energy, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and supporting recycling through the recovery of metals. According to a 2012 whitepaper released by Solid Waste Association of North America (SWANA), energy-from-waste facilities “are economically sound investments that provide multiple financial and environmental benefits to the communities that utilize them.”
How Energy-from-Waste Works
1. Municipal waste is delivered to our facilities and stored in a bunker.
2. The waste is transferred to a combustion chamber where self-sustaining combustion is maintained at extremely high temperatures. We maintain the building around the tipping and bunker area under negative pressure and use this air in the combustion process to control odor.
3. The heat from the combustion process boils water.
4. & 5. The steam from the boiling water is used directly, or more frequently, the steam drives a turbine that generates electricity.
6. Electricity is distributed to the local grid.
7. Ash from combustion is processed to extract metal for recycling. It is then combined with residue from the air pollution control process (see items 9 and 10).
8. The combined ash is either disposed of in a monofill (where only ash is stored) that receives only that waste, used as cover material at a conventional landfill, or landfilled with other waste.
9. All gases are collected, filtered and cleaned before being emitted into the atmosphere. We manage gas from the combustion process with state-of-the-art air pollution control technology that operates to state and federal standards.
10. We control emissions of particulate matter primarily through a baghouse (fabric filter).
11. We monitor criteria and other pollutants and operating parameters to ensure compliance with permit conditions.
