The waste conversion process begins with MSW being trucked to the facility and dumped on the tip floor of the MSW storage building. Large metal objects and materials with high reclamation value are removed from the waste stream and collected for recycling. Once these high value products are removed, the MSW is shredded and any remaining materials are removed and sent for recycling. Though sorting is not required, Plasco will work with the community to achieve its recycling goals. Current and future recycling programs initiated by the community have the full support of Plasco.
The MSW stream enters the conversion chamber where the material is gasified using recovered process heat. The crude gas that is produced flows to the refinement chamber where plasma torches are used to refine the gas into a cleaner, lighter PlascoSyngas. The catalytic properties and heat associated with plasma torches are used to break all long chain hydrocarbons, leaving an energetic PlascoSyngas.
Now refined, the PlascoSyngas is sent through a Gas Quality Control Suite to recover sulphur, remove acid gases and segregate heavy metals found in the waste stream. The result is a clean, energetic PlascoSyngas created from the conversion of waste with no air emissions.
The PlascoSyngas is used to fuel internal combustion engines that generate electricity. Waste heat recovered from the engines is combined with waste heat recovered from cooling the PlascoSyngas in a Heat Recovery Steam Generation (HRSG) unit to produce steam. The steam can either be used to generate additional electricity using a turbine or it can be used for industrial processes or district heating.
The solid residue from the gasification chamber is sent to a separate high temperature Carbon Recovery Vessel (CRV) equipped with a plasma torch where the solids are melted. Plasma heat is used to stabilize the solids by driving off any remaining volatile compounds and carbon, which are fed back into the conversion chamber. From the CRV, the liquid slag is cooled into small slag pellets. This vitrified residue is an inert, clean aggregate product. Leachability tests have been conducted on slag emerging from the process and have confirmed that the slag does not leach and is non-toxic.
The entire process is continuously monitored by a proprietary control system that ensures sufficient PlascoSyngas stability to fuel internal combustion engines regardless of the variations in the energy content of the MSW.
The Plasco Conversion System is the only waste conversion technology that can generate more than a megawatt-hour of net power per tonne of waste processed.