Pilot Chinese Recycling Facility Okays Sensor Based Sorting Tech from TOMRA

Sensor based waste sorting system manufacturer, TOMRA Sorting Recycling, has installed a number of its optical sorting systems at a recently completed Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) treatment plant in the Huli district of the city of Xiamen, Fujian Province, China. TOMRA explained that the plant operator, Alee, is using its TITECH autosort 4 and the TITECH x-tract – for the automated sorting of PE film, mixed hard plastic and Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF). The company said that the equipment is also being used for the cleaning of organics by sorting out inerts, such as stones and glass, before organic fermentation. Occupying an area of 7.6 hectares, the Xiamen MSW treatment plant typically sorts 640 tonnes of waste per day, with a maximum capacity of 800 tonnes per day. The first phase building at the plant was opened in 2011. The second phase included TOMRA Sorting sensor-based systems to automatically sort recyclables and equipment for the anaerobic digestion of organic waste. National pilot project From March 2013 onwards, TOMRA said that it installed and set up its sensor-based sorting systems as part of an agreement between Alee and Xiamen local government. Functional testing at the recycling plant was completed in June 2014, including a successful pilot run of the sensor based sorting equipment. Commercial operation by Alee began in August 2014, with the plant running for 14 hours a day, seven days a week. The plant being used as a national pilot project and in September last year was approved by central government. "The MSW sorting and treatment plant in Xiamen strikes a good balance between economic factors, environmental protection and social development,” commented Shi Zhihua, general manager at Xiamen Alee. "Our environmentally-friendly plant helps address the increasingly serious MSW issue in the city and make sustainable development possible,” continued Zhihua. “It also helps to improve the economy by sorting and separating useful materials from waste streams and transforming organic waste into electrical energy and fertiliser." According to TOMRA, the Xiamen MSW treatment plant was made possible by forward-looking government policy on the environment. While operator Alee was responsible for the initial investment of RMB206 million ($33.5 million) in the plant, after a number of years of operation, ownership of the plant will be transferred from Alee to local government. TOMRA Sorting Recycling’s country manager in China, Jacob Rognhaug, commented: "We are confident that the Xiamen plant is an example from which other cities in China can learn." Read More E-Waste Recycler Boosts Metal Recovery With Tomra UK Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) recycling firm, Sweeep Kuusakoski, has selected sensor based sorting equipment from TOMRA Sorting to upgrade and separate metallic fractions at its Kent recycling facility. Zorba: Small Particles Big Opportunities The global market for recovered mixed metals is continuing to expand. But when it comes to Zorba, a mix of shredded and pre-treated non-ferrous scrap metals, most metal reprocessors and MRF operators are missing a trick. There are commercial opportunities to exploit this often overlooked material. By Jöerg Schunicht. Sorted: The Comingled Glass Conundrum The use of comingled recycling collections has risen significantly over recent years. For many materials sorting techniques have proved adept at creating high quality recyclates from these collections. But in the case of glass there have been wide variations in the quality and quantity recovered. However, recent PHD research has identified methods to recover increased high quality volumes of glass from mixed recycling. By Ben Eule. How Recycled Material is Remoulding the Plastics Industry Establishing a strong and stable market for recycled plastics in the UK has been no small feat, Chris Hanlon, Biffa Polymers explains how it was achieved.