Displaying items by tag: Australia

Australia: Veolia ANZ and ResourceCo have secured a contract to supply over 1Mt of refuse derived fuel (RDF) from their Adelaide facility to Adbri Cement's Birkenhead plant, aiming to replace natural gas and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. According to Veolia, around 1.5Mt of waste will be diverted from landfill during the course of the contract.

Brett Brown, chief operating officer at Adbri, said "Adbri has pioneered the use of RDF in Australia. Cement manufacturing is energy intensive, and the use of alternative fuels is one of the levers we are using to reduce our emissions as part of our goal of net zero by 2050."

Australia: Adbri is targeting 40% refuse derived fuel (RDF) substitution in cement production at its Birkenhead, South Australia, cement plant in 2022. By 2024, it aims to further increase RDF use to 50%. The plant used 35% RDF in its production in 2021.

Adbri says that it is Australia's only cement producer not to use coal, relying instead on a combination of RDF and gas.

Australia: Boral plans to install chlorine bypass technology at its Berrima cement plant in New South Wales. The Illawara Mercury newspaper has reported that the installation will help the plant to double its alternative fuel (AF) substitution rate to 100%. This is one of the ways in which the producer aims to reduce its Scope One and Two emissions by 46% between 2020 and 2030.

Australia: Waste processer Focus Enviro receiving bookings for attendance at a demonstration of its new Untha XR Mobil-e shredder at its plant in Melbourne, Australia, on 20 February 2020. The new shredder will shred residual waste, wood waste and tyres, as might be expected in a cement industry AF application, with Focus Enviro and Untha employees on hand to answer questions. Untha director Gary Moore said, “With high throughputs, low whole life running costs and unrivalled energy efficiency, the XR has revolutionised the industry’s approach to waste shredding for production of RDF.” Bookings can be made by email.

Philippines: Holcim Philippines has conducted media tours of its Lugait cement plant in Misamis Oriental to raise awareness of its import of processed engineered fuels (PEF) from Australia. In May 2019 containers from Australia arrived at the Mindanao International Container Terminal in Tagoloan, Misamis Oriental, but were reported as misdeclared by the Bureau of Customs, according to the Sun Star newspaper. However, Frederic Vallat, Holcim Philippines' vice-president for Alternative Fuels and Alternative raw material and head of Geocycle, said that the Tariff Commission had classified the shipment as PEF in early June 2019. The Environmental Management Bureau also notified the Bureau of Customs that it had no objection to imports of PEF.

The PEF shipment was described as, "a plastic based fluffy fuel with high calorific value consisting by weight, 75 – 85% flexible plastics, paper and natural and hydrocarbon based fibre, 7 – 15% hard plastics, 1 – 5% wood and < 1 – 5% non-combustible inert material in the form of solid flakes (range of particle sizes less than 50 mm), mixed colours with natural odour." It added that the PEF has a gross calorific value of 5700 - 7200kcal/kg, 15% ash content, 20% moisture, 1.5% sulphur and 1% chlorine. It is sourced from municipal wastes such as plastics, rubber, wood, paper, textiles, glass, metals, food materials, broken furniture, and other damaged or discarded articles.

Vallat said that at present, Holcim Philippines has stopped the import of PEF from Australia. They are now in dialogue with the Bureau of Customs over the issue. The company would like to import PEF locally but it was only able to source 7000t in 2018 and its plant needs up to 60,000t/yr.

Australia: Focus Enviro, a waste and organic equipment specialist, has secured an exclusive agreement with Austria’s Untha, making it the distribution partner for Untha’s shredding technology in Australia. Focus has its headquartered in New South Wales and it has a presence in Victoria, Queensland and the west of the country.

Untha’s director for global business development, Gary Moore, described Australia as one of the most exciting energy from waste markets in the world despite alternative fuel production being less developed than in Europe. “Landfill rates are rising, environmental pressures are mounting, China’s landmark movement has forced a new direction for the country’s waste framework, and a number of international waste operators, with a presence in Australia, are driving a global knowledge transfer programme to strengthen resource security,” said Moore.

Australia: Adelaide Brighton boss Martin Brydon said that he would pursue funding from the Abbott Government's US$2.55bn Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF) as Adelaide Brighton accelerates its alternative fuel use to head off its rising gas bill. The ERF is the centre-piece of the government's direct action climate policy and the first auction for funding starts on 15 April 2015.

Adelaide Brighton has a total energy bill of around US$130m/yr. Brydon said that the group will save US$6m/yr from the repeal of the carbon tax. "We are energy-intensive and capital-intensive. Anything that happens that can reduce the cost of energy is critical," said Brydon.

Adelaide Brighton's Birkenhead cement plant in south Australia, which recently expanded its cement production capacity to 750,000t/yr, generates 15% of its energy from waste wood used in construction. Brydon said that he plans to take that number to 30% and that he 'will certainly' be bidding for grants from the ERF. "The cost of that waste wood energy is significantly below the cost of natural gas," said Brydon.

In 2014, Adelaide Brighton reported a 14.3% rise in net profit to US$136m and a 9% rise in revenue to US$1.06bn. The profit and revenue numbers were both records for the company, although after stripping out one-off items the underlying profit was US$132m. Strong residential housing activity in NSW and Queensland, work on the Pacific Highway upgrade and ongoing demand from resource projects in western Australia and the northern regions buoyed sales. Adelaide Brighton said that it expects price increases in 2015 across all of its products.

In August 2014 the company acquired two concrete businesses and a quarry. Brydon said that he is looking for other businesses to buy, but opportunities for quality long-term assets were 'few and far between.'

Australia: The Boral cement plant in Berrima, New South Wales, will receive a US$3.3m grant from the Environmental Trust as part of the NSW Environment Protection Authority's Waste Less, Recycle More initiative. The funding will be used to increase the use of waste derived fuels at the plant.

Executive general manager for Boral Cement Ross Harper said the achievement of the grant confirmed the potentially-important role that the New Berrima site could play in reducing the increasing impact of re-usable materials ending up in landfills.

"Since September, we have been informing our local stakeholders about the positive environmental and economic effects which can be obtained by replacing a portion of our coal consumption at Berrima with fuels derived from recovered and processed waste streams," said executive general manager for Boral Cement, Ross Harper.

Boral is currently preparing to submit planning applications which will seek approval for the use of wood waste-derived fuel and refuse-derived fuel in production at the Berrima plant. The site already holds an approval to use rubber tyre chips. Pending approvals, the site is looking to begin integration of the two fuels from the start of 2016 following construction of the new infrastructure.