Waste‐to‐Chemicals for a Circular Economy: The Case of Urea Production (Waste‐to‐Urea)

Abstract

The economics and environmental impact of a new technology for the production of urea from municipal solid waste, particularly the residue-derived fuel (RdF) fraction, is analyzed. Estimates indicate a cost of production of approximately €135 per ton of urea (internal rate of return more than 10 %) and savings of approximately 0.113 tons of CH and approximately 0.78 tons of CO per ton of urea produced. Thus, the results show that this waste-to-urea (WtU) technology is both economically valuable and environmentally advantageous (in terms of saving resources and limiting carbon footprint) for the production of chemicals from municipal solid waste in comparison with both the production of urea with conventional technology (starting from natural gas) and the use of RdF to produce electrical energy (waste-to-energy). A further benefit is the lower environmental impact of the solid residue produced from RdF conversion. The further benefit of this technology is the possibility to realize distributed fertilizer production.

Chemical engineering role in the use of renewable energy and alternative carbon sources in chemical production

“…We believe that based on these aspects, the use of a high temperature (HT) converter as that presented in Fig. 1 is preferable [57,58]. A temperature gradient is present along the vertical axis with two oxygen injections in the heating (800-1000°C) and melting (1000-1600°C) areas.…”

“…Methanol, urea, H 2 , CH 4 , olefins, aromatics are some of the possibilities, starting from RdF. They are feasible from a techno-economic perspective [36,57,58]. The use of mixed RdF and biowaste from agro-food production is also possible.…”

“…In addition, with respect to incineration of the same waste, there are environmental advantages. For example, in waste-to-urea process, a reduction of about 0.8 tons of CO 2 emitted per ton of urea produced can be estimated [57].…”

Ripe for disruption: reimagining the role of green chemistry in a circular economy

“…Developing better chemical recycling processes, separating polymers from additives and replenishing monomers or feedstocks, would at the same time enable higher value material loops. One crucial question for chemists to answer is how to design these chemical recycling systems, given the range of options at hand: from recovering specific materials in isolation (37) to integrating them into a more general cycle of platform chemicals (38).…”

Medaillen der Società Chimica Italiana für 2017

“…Er befasst sich in seiner Forschung mit der angewandten heterogenen Katalyse, dem Engineering chemischer Reaktionen und mit Reaktionsmechanismen, wobei der Schwerpunkt auf der Nutzung von CO 2 , chemischen Prozessen, die erneuerbare Energie nutzen, und der Entwicklung photoelektrokatalytischer Funktionseinheiten liegt. In ChemSusChem hat er über die Erzeugung von Harnstoff aus kommunalem Abfall berichtet …”