Turning plastic waste into clean energy

RPF burning pellets

CO2 cut by half

RPF pellets are used widely in the world to partially replace fossil fuels such as coal and coke, being much cheaper and environmentally friendly.

Yuri Takano, Chief Representative of Japan’s IKE Waste Treatment Company in Hanoi, said the technology has been popular in Japan for more than 30 years. “All types of waste such as plastic, paper and wood can be sold and recycled for immediate use. The components that are not thoroughly sorted and hard to recycle are used as burning pellets and this is the simplest waste treatment technology,” Takano said.

In Vietnam, this technology has been tested and used by the Dai Dong Environment Solutions Co., Ltd (Hung Yen Province), a joint venture between URENCO 11, a member of the Hanoi Urban Environment Company (URENCO) and IKE, for many years, contributing significantly to reducing the impact of plastic waste on the environment.

Compared to burning coal, using RPF helps cut carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by half, and 90 to 100 percent of sulfur dioxide (SO2), bringing plastic waste back into circulation as an environmentally friendly burning fuel.

Price challenge

According to a representative of URENCO 11, the company used to treat waste by burying or burning which required an area of land, while components such as plastic did not decompose, while the production of RPF helps take advantage of that waste resource.

Solid waste is transported to the incinerator

Input sources for the production of RPF pellets are mainly PP and PE plastic, paper, and wood chips from URENCO 11's customers across the northern region. They are sorted, cleaned, crushed and compressed into pellets. One tonne of garbage can produce one tonne of the burning fuel. RPF pellets can generate 20 to 30 percent more heat compared to coal.

Vu Dinh Thang from the Sub-Department of Standards, Metrology and Quality under the Hung Yen Department of Science and Technology affirmed that this technology creates useful products, and avoids emissions of two toxic substances, sulfur dioxide and carbon dioxide.

Although the product is environmentally friendly, the biggest difficulty in using RPF is the price, being more labor intensive than other waste treatment methods.

Currently, the RPF burning pellets have been on trial use at eight enterprises, including the CJ Vina Agri Co., Ltd Hung Yen branch and the Hai Duong Paper Joint Stock Company.

URENCO 11 also has a problem with the amount of electricity consumed. The production of one kilogram of RPF costs about 300 Vietnamese dong of electricity. “This factor lowers the competitive advantage in price of the pellets compared to traditional fuel sources. Price is the biggest challenge when convincing customers to use this product. If RPF has a higher selling price than the fuel they are using, they will not accept it,” the URENCO 11 official said.