Energy from waste: advanced thermal technologies

Chemistry and Industry, May 25, 2009 by Steve Waller

The UK's Government is committed to reducing the quantities of waste disposed to landfill to comply with the Landfill Directive. The Environmental Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN) has identified an opportunity for the UK 'to offset 34 million tonnes of carbon from fossil fuel by implementing energy from waste technologies'.

Technologies that convert energy from waste can broadly be categorised as either biological or thermal. Biological processes are generally associated with anaerobic digestion, while thermal processes can be broken down into combustion and gasification. Examples of these include secondary recovered fuels for cement kilns and advanced thermal technologies such as gasification, pyrolysis and plasma treatment.

'Energy from waste: advanced thermal technologies' is a one-day event hosted jointly by the SCI's Environment and Process Engineering Groups, and supported by the Lancaster Environment Centre and the Environmental KTN. It will concentrate mainly on the more advanced thermal processes, with the morning session being largely technical; reviewing technologies and case studies from a range of industrial and academic speakers. The afternoon will concentrate on regulatory, environmental and commercial issues. There will be opportunities for discussion of these topics and a small number of exhibition/poster places are available for academic or industrial organisations to promote their activities.

The Lancaster Environment Centre is a multidisciplinary research centre comprising a number of divisions within Lancaster University and the Natural Environment Research Council's Centre for Ecology and Hydrology. The partnership between the two organisations employs over 300 environmental researchers from across natural and applied sciences, humanities, management and engineering, making the grouping one of the largest of its kind anywhere in Europe.

This event is taking place at Lancaster University on Thursday, 18 June. For more information or to book your place, please email conferences@soci.org

Steve Waller, Stopford Projects: Hon. Secretary of SCI's Environment Group