Abstract

Federico Zonarelli*, Giovanni Scarano**, Paolo Neri***

LCA analysis of the incineration process and residues treatment of 1 kg of sanitary waste by the incinerator of Ponte Malnome (Rome).

* Graduated in Environmental Economy - University of Studies “Roma Tre”
** Professor – Department of Economy - University of Studies “Roma Tre”
*** Senior Researcher - ENEA (Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and the Environment), PROT-INN Department, Bologna, Italy

This study is a result by the collaboration among the University of Studies “Roma Tre” (Rome) and the public institute of research “ENEA” (Bologna).

This research aims to evaluate the life-cycle impact of the incineration of the sanitary wastes. It also considers the energy production of the incineration and the treatment residues’ process such as slags, ashes and processed water.

The industrial installation is the incinerator “Ponte Malnome”, AMA S.p.A. (environmental company for the urban wastes of Rome).
The studied system does not include what happens before the conferment of the wastes at the incinerator.
The incineration process impact is evaluated with the Life-Cycle Assessment study (LCA). We used the Dutch software SimaPro 5.0, developed by Pré Consultant, and three methods: Eco-indicator 99 (Dutch), EPS 2000 (Swedish) and EDIP 96 (Danish).

The first part of the research is bibliographic: there is a representation of the Italian situation on special wastes production and it includes the sanitary wastes production in relation with the Italian’s hospitals capacity. There is also a view on the laws about the wastes treatment in Italy and a presentation of the AMA company.

In the second part there is the analysis of the sanitary wastes treatment, analyzed with the three methods. There is a confrontation between the incineration system with energy production and the incineration system without energy production. There is a confrontation between some electricity-production plant and the incinerator as an electricity producer.

This study establishes the environmental impact of the incinerator process on the damage categories (human health, ecosystem quality, resources) and also, in a more specific way, over the single impact categories, that are one or more for each damage category (for example, in human health there are: carcinogens, respiratory inorganic, climate change, ozone depletion…). The utilization of more than one method allows to have different points of view: each method has its own framework, giving information that others are not able to give.

The research was entirely realized by ENEA, Bologna, Italy and the data about the incinerator plant have been withdrawn by the AMA company. The rest of the data were provided by the data archives used for the Life Cycle Assessment.