Waste Recycling

Waste-to-energy has its limits and risks. After waste is collected, the focus should primarily be on thorough sorting, recycling, and final recovery, says the director of VÚMZ SK.

Robert Procházka | Foto: Archív RP

Waste sorting line from VÚMZ SK

Waste Recycling and Waste Management

“The waste management system in Slovakia has not been properly set up for a long time and requires changes. One of the priorities must be to ensure that waste processors are motivated to find ways to recycle not only the sorted components but also the mixed municipal waste itself.”

This was stated for Odpady-portal.sk by Robert Procházka, Executive Director of the technology and manufacturing company VÚMZ SK, which operates in the Slovak recycling market and focuses on the production and development of technologies, primarily for waste management.

Motivations are important

According to R. Procházka, recycling companies must be systematically and financially motivated to process an increasing amount and better quality of municipal waste, including both mixed waste and its pre-separated components.

He believes that the waste management system should be set up in a way that allows for the extraction of all recyclable materials from the waste, which can be further utilized either in Slovakia or abroad, with the aim of significantly reducing or stopping its disposal in landfills.

“It is a logical step and also a legislative effort by the EU to primarily motivate process recycling and recovery, and to set up the system in EU countries accordingly. We can see this in practice through the examples of our neighbors,” says R. Procházka.

“What the market is no longer able to extract from waste and further process, that is, recover, should be properly energy recovered, meaning incinerated to generate energy from waste, ideally using a combined method. However, the key is to achieve the required conversion efficiency, not just ‘burning for the sake of burning,'” says the expert.

According to him, investments in waste management in the past were distorted by co-financing, which was not based on actual economic parameters or “green” criteria, but on entirely different principles.

“The number of recycling lines worldwide is not decreasing, on the contrary, it is growing. Almost on a weekly basis, we are addressing inquiries in the area of sorting and recycling lines, not only from Slovakia. Optical devices, screens, conveyors, shredders, and other equipment for the waste industry are manufactured by us, so we are seeing a steadily growing demand in this segment,” says the CEO of VÚMZ SK.

Recycling waste must be a priority.

According to R. Procházka, the primary goal of waste management should be to ensure that everything with economic value is extracted from the produced waste. Energy recovery from waste is considered a rational choice only after this condition has been met.

“This is how the current EU legislation is set up, and this is how it needs to be incorporated into the local legislation of its individual member states. In the case of incineration, we should also be talking about a truly efficient waste-to-energy system, where the efficiency of incineration and the extraction of other forms of energy from the process reaches at least 70%. As far as I know, we do not yet have such facilities in Slovakia,” emphasizes the director of VÚMZ SK.

According to him, the development of waste-to-energy is also hindered by the high investment costs, which are associated with strict environmental protection requirements, as well as the permitting processes, including the “large EIA.”

“Let’s stay grounded and try to set up the system in a way that motivates processors to find the most cost-effective solutions for recovering one ton of waste. This way, we will achieve the right combination of different solutions and gradually be able to close the circular economy loop,” continues R. Procházka.

The Slovak customer is specific

According to R. Procházka, the current crisis associated with the COVID-19 pandemic has had a relatively mild impact on the Slovak recycling technology market.

“The coronavirus crisis, given our broader portfolio of products and services, including setting directions in the industry, did not affect us as severely as it did companies with a narrower focus, such as those in the automotive industry,” R. Procházka responded to our question.

According to R. Procházka, there is currently the greatest interest among VÚMZ SK’s customers in technologies that help save operational costs, increase production capacity, or improve the output quality of the product.

“These primarily include transportation or sorting systems, in Slovakia mainly optical, magnetic, non-magnetic, vibrational, centrifugal, or simple manual sorting lines, and abroad, also laser systems, as well as various handling systems,” said R. Procházka.

“The Slovak customer is specific in that, in addition to the technological solution itself, they also want to see the economics of their project,” he pointed out, adding that such a solution requires the customer to make their inputs and outputs available to the contractor, which will be worked with.

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