Design and analysis of a capacitive moisture sensor for municipal solid waste

This paper presents a capacitive sensor conception to measure the moisture content ( MC) in municipal solid waste that is primarily used for energy recovery by means of combustion. The sensor principle is based on a two-channel I/Q measurement of the complex impedance of the waste. The specific design of the sensor front-end allows for a robust MC determination in a non-contacting manner. In this paper, a detailed analysis of the sensor performance, including an estimation of the sensor cross-sensitivity on saline contamination and on metal components in the waste, is provided. Experiments are conducted under laboratory conditions and measurement results are presented.