Efficiency of biological and mechanical-biological treatment plants for MSW: the case of Spain

Abstract

Biological and mechanical biological treatment plants combine mechanical and biological treatments to recover the greatest possible amount of materials from municipal solid waste (MSW) and biostabilize the organic fraction to be landfilled or applied in land. These plants handle a high percentage of the MSW generated in Europe. This work presents an exhaustive analysis of the existing plants in Spain which evaluates their typology as well as their performance. In Spain, 137 plants, which receive 13 Mt/year of waste, provide the country with total coverage. Twenty-two types of plants have been identified and grouped into six categories. There are four categories that receive mixed MSW: 1) sorting plants; 2) recovery and composting plants; 3) biodrying and recovery plants; and 4) recovery, biomethanation and composting plants and two that receive separately collected biowaste: 5) composting plants, and 6) biomethanation and composting plants. In plants that receive mixed waste, around 5% of the total input is recovered as recyclable materials (662,182 t/year), of which 29% corresponds to plastics, 27% to metals, and 27% to paper and cardboard. In addition, biostabilized material and/or biogas, and rejects (45–77% of the input) are obtained. In the biowaste plants, high-quality compost (more than 105,000 t/year), a higher biogas yield (43.60 Nm3/t⋅year) and a lower proportion of rejects (around 29%) are obtained.