Open AccessAssessment of the Environmental, Technical and Economic Issues Associated with Energy Recovery from Municipal Solid Waste in Malaysia
Author(s) -
Mohammed J.K. Bashir,
Choon Aun Ng,
Sumathi Sethupathi,
Jun-Wei Lim
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
iop conference series. earth and environmental science
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1755-1307
pISSN - 1755-1315
DOI - 10.1088/1755-1315/268/1/012044
Subject(s) - incineration , municipal solid waste , waste management , waste to energy , energy recovery , landfill gas , production (economics) , environmental science , engineering , mobile incinerator , environmental engineering , waste collection , energy (signal processing) , statistics , mathematics , economics , macroeconomics
Malaysia is a fast emerging economy country and its outlook on sustainable energy production are at the center of debate. Although waste to energy (WtE) technologies are well established but the disconformity of the municipal solid waste (MSW) composition, the complexity of the treatment facilities, and the pollutant emissions still express considerable issues for these technologies. Hence, this study focuses on WtE technologies in Malaysia by considering the energy potentials of the landfill sites and incineration plants as the most common effective MSW in Malaysia. The major environmental, technical and economic issues associated with WtE technologies were evaluated. An annual growth rate of 3.3% has been projected for MSW production in Malaysia. The most common used WtE technologies were incineration and controlled landfill to capture Landfill Gas (LFG). Malaysia MSW contains 60% biodegradable fraction, making landfills a potential source of LFG. Although, the potential of energy recovery from waste in Malaysia is high but the current production is less than 20 MW of electricity per day.