Canada: The Capital Regional District (CRD) in British Colombia has signed a memorandum of understanding with Ḱenes Transportation, a Wsáneć First Nations partnership company, to contract the transportation of biomass produced at a sewage treatment unit at Hartland Landfill to Lafarge Canada’s Richmond cement plant. The dehydrated biofuel made from treated wastewater is then coprocessed as an alternative fuel at the integrated cement plant. The agreement will last up to five years while the CRD develops long term plans for the biosolids, according to the Times Colonist newspaper.

South Korea: SungShin Cement has placed an order with Denmark-based FLSmidth for the supply of two HotPlate combustion devices for installation in lines three and six of its SungShin cement plant. The plant is in the transition from coal fuel to the possibility of 100% alternative fuel (AF) use in the two lines, which it plans to commission in mid and late 2021 respectively.

Team manager of production technology Cho K-R said, “With its degree of flexibility, the HotDisc allows us to substitute coal with a wide range of AFs – refuse-derived fuel (RDF) in our case. As we turn waste into energy, the HotDisc lowers our operating costs without compromising energy efficiency.”

FLSmidth previously delivered two HotDiscs to South Korea, to SsangYong’s Donghae and Yeongwool cement plants.

Ireland: The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has announced a new date of 2 December 2020 for the hearing of objections against Irish Cement’s refuse-derived fuel (RDF) substitution plans at its Limerick plant. It was postponed from May 2020 due to the coronavirus outbreak, according to the Irish Examiner newspaper. The hearing will take place remotely due to local coronavirus-related social distancing rules.

Irish Cement received its preliminary licence to burn up to 90,000t/yr of RDF at its Limerick plant in September 2019. However, the agency has allowed an oral hearing due to local feeling on the matter. In a separate incident the integrated plant was previously fined Euro4000 for dust emissions in late 2018.

Germany: Vecoplan has launched the VRZ 2500 shredder and the VPC 1600 pre-shredder, which can be combined with the VHZ single-shaft shredder.

The new addition to the VRZ series is intended for recycling and reprocessing waste wood. The unit is equipped with sickle-shaped ripper teeth and is intended for minimal maintenance through the use of HiTorc direct drives. The drives have a capacity of 2 x 138kw and are resistant to tramp materials. They are also dynamic, offering improved start-up and reversing behaviour. “During the development of the new VRZ series shredder, we placed great emphasis on making it robust, resistant to intrusive materials, reliable and low-maintenance,” said Martin Baldus, Head of Industrial Shredding development at Vecoplan.

The VPC 1600 is a pre-shredder intended for use with voluminous objects and bulky wooden items such as pallets. Notably, the new version of this product can be combined with the VHZ single-shaft shredders (VHZ 1600 and VPC 1600) to increase throughput by up to 50% and to save space. With its working width of 1600mm, the 800mm-high VPC is designed to fit exactly onto the VHZ with a sliding frame connecting the shredder and the pre-shredder. The VPC is permanently fixed during operation but it is designed to be moved at other times if an operator has to change the counter-knives in the shredder. The filler port of the new pre-shredder measures 1605 x 1605mm and the drive power is 2 x 9.2kw. Sixteen counter-crushers have been integrated into the machine and it also has two independently running rotors, each with a speed of ten revolutions per minute.