CHE.01 – Trash to Gas

• Aiman Azmy
• Laura Brito Uriostegui
• Amna Nasir
• Sajjid Odeh

There is a linear correlation between the increase in population and the increase in waste, in the United States, on average each household generates over 1700 pounds per year. This problem will continue to increase, which will require more land to store waste and it will release toxic chemicals into the atmosphere, nearby ecosystems, and neighborhoods. As municipal solid waste continues to sit in landfills it can create leachate which will further contaminate groundwater and is harmful for human health. The proposed solution to this problem is to convert 29,762 tons of municipal solid waste (MSW) per year into 40,011 tons of synthetic gas (syngas) per year. The pretreatment will remove ferrous and non-ferrous metals from MSW which will generate an income for our plant and reduce the ash content. The rest of the MSW will be converted into a slurry that will be fed to a gasifier and then be sent to a cleaning system consisting of a water scrubber, COS Hydrolysis reactor, and amine columns to remove contaminants such as carbonyl sulfide and hydrogen sulfide. This project will reduce the volume of the landfill in Livermore, California, and generate various sources of income for the facility including landfill tipping fees, recovery of metals, syngas, and slag.