A Toxicity Reduction Exercise for Municipal Solid Waste to Energy Fly-Ash Utilising a Separation, Isolation and Treatment Process

Abstract

The current situation for fly ash management and policy regulation in the United Kingdom / European Union, has developed the need for new toxicity reduction exercises. New EU wide policies are changing the type of treatment methods that can be legally used for the residues from waste-to-energy plants. In particular the disposal of flue gas treatment residues, which are classified as a hazardous waste, will not be acceptable to landfill according to the Waste Acceptance Criteria without a pre-treatment by 2007. This has raised a number of interesting engineering questions that need to be addressed. The novel TRE of metal matrix encapsulation has been designed based upon the principles of separation, isolation and treatment to meet these new criteria. Metal matrix encapsulation is a treatment program that employs existing industrial infrastructure to improve its usability and legal compliance.