Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) used to be seen as an environmental problem with associated disposal issues.

As such, experts from Hallam Energy, part of our Materials and Engineering Research Institute, are looking at ways to turn MSW into a resource for power generation to minimise these problems.
 
We are working with Group Rhodes in Wakefield through the Knowledge Transfer Partnership scheme to develop autoclaves for processing MSW. Autoclaves are similar to gigantic pressure cookers. We plan to use them to turn MSW into fibre flock which can be used for anaerobic digestion, or pelletised for direct combustion or gasification.
 
Using a range of tools from experimental pressure vessel testing to computational fluid dynamics simulations, we are finding ways to optimise the design of the autoclave and to cut the manufacturing and running costs in order to make it a commercially viable solution.
 
These autoclaves will essentially provide an alternative to incineration and minimise landfill. The image above shows the first prototype that has been built and is now undergoing field tests in Wakefield.