RDF Production Potential in Turkey: Istanbul Case Study

Turkey is among the world's top cement producers, which has 55 active integrated cement plants. Normally cement facilities require fuel to meet the energy needed during production. According to the literature, at least 65 % of this fuel can be compensated through alternative fuels. The use of alternative fuels was 88 thousand tons in Turkey in 2008, and exceeded one million tons in 2018. From the interviews with the cement industry, it can be concluded that the targets shall increase continuously in the upcoming years and investments to increase the amount of alternative fuel use shall be widely applied. The Turkish Cement Manufacturers' Association (TCMA) claims that Turkey has a potential to produce the RDF to provide the secondary fuels for the cement industry. In the interviews held with the 39 district municipalities on behalf of Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality (IBB), it is estimated that there is a waste potential sufficient for the production of 1200 tons/day RDF. For this study, the different types of non-hazardous industrial and commercial waste that is brought to the RDF facility of ISTAC as well their mixtures had been sampled and sent to the laboratory for analysis. Parameters such as moisture, density, pH, higher calorific value, chlorine content, ignition loss, total sulphur content, lower calorific value and ash content were analyzed in accordance with the criteria on the Directive on Fuel Generated from waste, additional fuel and alternative raw material [1] in order to identify the optimal mixture rate of the RDF materials for the cement industry.