Electricity generation potential of municipal solid wastes produced in the province of Edirne

Abstract

As a result of Turkey's economic growth, industrial development has accelerated across the country and this has ultimately led to the environmental sector and waste management gaining importance. In Turkey, where there is a depletion of natural resources, the expansion of energy demand, and the orientation in environmental technologies, waste is no longer a problematic issue that needs to be eliminated; but it has become a source of raw materials whose processing and recycling can be achieved with today's technology. In the scope of sustainable development, the waste hierarchy includes the three priority targets. These are prevention of waste production, reuse, recycling, or recovery respectively. The method for non-recoverable wastes is landfilling with energy recovery if possible. In this context, this study aims to investigate the electricity generation potential of the solid wastes disposed at the Edirne Solid Waste Landfill Facility. When the amount of waste to be sent to the facility, which was assumed to have a 20-year economic life, increases by 5% in parallel with the population profile, it is seen that electricity production will go up rapidly until 2040. However, the results of the study present that the potential of methane production will fall as the stored waste age increases so that a significant decrease in electricity production should be expected from 2045 onwards. Once it is considered that the facility continues to produce electricity for a hundred years beyond 2040, the electricity generated from the facility will contribute to the electricity network and provide the avoidance of approximately 25 thousand tons of CO2 on a national basis.