Sewage Sludge Incineration

 

 

About 3.2 million tons of sewage sludge are accrued every year in the Federal Republic of Germany. 2.7 million tons of this sewage sludge must be disposed of. In Sachsen-Anhalt, Saxony and Thuringia alone these are about 600.000 tons.

The disposal routes have more and more changed during the last years. More and more one has refrained from a further disposal of sewage sludge onto the fields as this is not useful ecologically. It does not only produce over-fertilization but also could lead to an accumulation of heavy metals in the farmland.

Therefore cheaper options for recycling are increasingly looked for. Such an option is already available with burning sewage sludge in coal-fired power plants, as these power plants have already the technical facilities and there is only the necessity to retrofit the sewage sludge acceptance area, the interim storage and the transportation unit.

MUEG and MIBRAG mbH have found such a possibility for incinerating sewage sludge in the industrial power plant “Phönix“of  Mumsdorf und in the Deuben power plant. Here, sewage sludge is burnt together with lignite. Since 2007 the waste type catalogue has been extended by bio-sludge. This is sludge from the waste water treatment plants of pulp mills and paper mills. The burning capacity for both power plants is 200.000 tons/a.