Making electricity from garbage

The government decided to implement projects to install plants to generate 304MW of electricity from garbage in different cities of the country.
Projects with an aggregate capacity of 57 MW were already in various stages of implementation. Agricultural, industrial and biogas waste products would be used in energy projects, to generate approximately 247MW of power.
A senior official on Wednesday said that agricultural waste projects were being executed in Sindh to generate 21MW, 12MW were produced in Shahkot, 12MW in Okara and 12MW were being generated in Pak Pattan.
He said that projects through industrial waste, with an aggregate capacity of 247MW, included 27MW to be produced in DI Khan. A project to generate 15MW was signed between PESICO and Al-Moiz Industries. A Power Purchase Agreement had been signed by FESCO and Shakarganj Sugar Mills to produce 7MW while 14 new energy projects, with the cumulative capacity of 213MW had been awarded a generation license by NEPRA.
The official said that a Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF) was also being produced by converting municipal waste into combustible components through dehydration. Presently, a number of RDF plants were producing and selling fuel to the cement industry.
Highlighting other initiatives, he said that a waste-to-energy study was being carried out with reference to Karachi, to generate 10MW of power, while financing had been arranged for detailed Municipal Solid Waste, Liquid Waste and Animal Waste-to-Energy studies for 20 large cities in the country.
He said that a pilot plant for the Landhi Cattle Colony Biogas project had been completed and bids were being received from the private sector, for the generation of 30MW of electricity from Landhi Cattle Colony waste after the completion of a feasibility study.
The official said that 14,000 biogas plants were being constructed through a Rs 365 million grant. He added that these projects were located in Punjab, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Sindh.
Some of these projects were operational while others were at various stages of development, and most of them were expected to reach at the level of financial close by 2013.