Property Analysis of Municipal Solid Waste and Estimation of CO2 Emissions from Waste Incinerators

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is known to be a major greenhouse gas partially emitted from waste combustion facilities. According to the greenhouse gas emission inventory in Korea, the quantity of the gas emitted from waste sector in 2005 represents approximately 2.5 percent of all domestic greenhouse gas emission. Currently, the emission rate of greenhouse gas from the waste sector is relatively constant partly because of both the reduced waste disposal in landfills and the increased amounts of waste materials for recycling. However, the greenhouse gas emission rate in waste sectors is anticipated to continually increase, mainly due to increased incineration of solid waste. The objective of this study was to analyze the property of Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) and estimate CO2 emissions from domestic MSW incineration facilities. The CO2 emission rates obtained from the facilities were surveyed, along with other two methods, including Tier 2a based on 2006 IPCC Guideline default emission factor and Tier 3 based on facility specific value. The CO2 emission rates were calculated by using CO2 concentrations and gas flows measured from the stacks. Other parameters such as waste composition, dry matter content, carbon content, oxidation coefficient of waste were included for the calculation. The CO2 average emission rate by the Tier 2a was 34,545 ton/y, while Tier 3 was 31,066 ton/y. Based on this study, we conclude that Tier 2a was overestimated by 11.2 percent for the CO2 emission observed by Tier 3. Further study is still needed to determine accurate CO2 emission rates from municipal solid waste incineration facilities and other various combustion facilities by obtaining countryspecific emission factor, rather than relying on IPCC default emission factor.