Greening projects encouraging industry to adopt circular economy

15th August 2014

By: Mia Breytenbach

Creamer Media Deputy Editor: Features

  

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Local industry is starting to implement projects using the principles associated with the ‘circular economy, with specific focus on developing a greener industry, says consulting engineering firm Royal HaskoningDHV.

A circular economy entails industry transitioning to a restorative perspective, with a focus on reuse of items generally considered to be waste.

“There are several examples of fully operational greening projects that showcase the successes achieved and provide industry with the opportunity to take the initiative to replicate these projects and make it a widespread practice,” says deputy business unit director for the Royal HaskoningDHV Industry & Energy Business Unit Dr Raylene Watson.

Royal HaskoningDHV industrial process review portfolio manager Stuart Thompson agrees, citing a project for a brewery in KwaZulu-Natal as an example. Royal HaskoningDHV and the brewery investigated how they could convert the methane gas captured from the effluent of the beer making process into heat to power the boilers. The boilers currently use heavy fuel oil derived from a nonrenewable source, which leads to particulate and sulphur pollution.

“The brewery reroutes the gas into the brewery boiler using the flame to boil the water instead of using only heavy fuel oil, reducing heavy fuel oil use by about 40%,” Thompson says, adding that this reduces the company’s greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions as well as the use of a poor-quality fuel source.

Another greening initiative entails a trigeneration project for a calcium carbide plant in KwaZulu-Natal. The project was established at the end of 2012 and has been operational for more than a year, says Royal HaskoningDHV environmental engineer Siva Chetty.

He explains that the plant, which uses coal to produce calcium carbide as a raw material for downstream industrial processes, also produces a furnace gas during the heating of lime and carbon. This gas – containing carbon monoxide and hydrogen – would otherwise be released into the environment as a pollutant rather than captured as a fuel source. So the furnace gas is now rerouted to generate electricity.

From this cogeneration initiative, the plant reduces its GHG emissions while reducing pressure on State-owned power utility Eskom’s power network, Chetty says.

He highlights another greening project at a denim factory in Lesotho, for which Royal HaskoningDHV proposed a cleaner technology application, which entailed reusing factory effluent for the denim manufacturing process.

“We offered a solution that would dry the sludge and that would enable the plant to separate the dyes from the effluent and contain it in a lateral area. Consequently, the effluent is no longer contaminated and can be returned for use in the environment,” Chetty adds.

“This intervention has prevented possible closure due to pollution and has enabled its contribution to the local economy to continue,” he notes.

Green Initiatives
Watson believes that the circular economy concept is a viable concept for South African industry and notes that there are several motivations for industry to explore and implement this concept.

“The greatest impetus for companies to consider greening the industry and applying the circular economy concept is the change in legislation, such as amendments to the Waste Act of 2008, the Air Quality Act of 2004, the Biodiversity Act of 2004 and the impending carbon tax,” she says.

Watson notes that the changing legislation requires self-evaluation by each entity amid all other entities, which would, therefore, result in industry being cumulatively restricted to limited polluting. This may create a challenge to becoming green, as industries may have to collaborate and experiment with different technology options, she adds.

Further, while the ‘polluter pays’ principle is evident in these Acts, industry can also face certain fines, penalties and physical sanctions if it does not implement changes to reduce its waste and air emissions, Watson explains.

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he says there is also a financial incentive for companies to investigate these projects, owing to increasing energy prices, while energy and water supply insecurity are also driving the investigation of new greening technologies and waste reuse options, adding that other incentives include a job creation and a health incentive to reduce health spend and increase economic productivity.

Edited by Megan van Wyngaardt
Creamer Media Contributing Editor Online

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