• Energy Research

The increased consumption of meat (including poultry) observed over the last decade has led to the intensification of its production. With the production increase, the amount of generated waste also increases. Appropriate disposal of waste from the meat industry will significantly reduce the amount of such waste and its negative impact on the environment. The paper presents a method for the thermal neutralisation of feathers, poultry litter and meat and bone meal (MBM). Waste incineration was carried out in a stationary electric furnace, at a temperature varying in the range of 600-900°C. The resulting ashes were characterised by a high percentage of phosphorus (30-170 g/kg ash), calcium (20-360 g/kg ash) and other valuable macro- and micronutrients like copper, iron, manganese and zinc. The ashes produced during the thermal treatment are safe in terms of sanitary and can be used as additives enriching the fertilisers and soil improvers.

Problem statement: For purification of smoke in PPHU Duda-Bis Plant water washers, placed in the outlet channel of smoke chamber, have been applied, but the amount of the substances remaining in the air after passing through the washer were not acceptable by the standards and caused repulsive odor emitted into the atmosphere. Approach: To eliminate discomfort, caused by smoke emission unto the environment, PPHU Duda-Bis has been introduced a simple and effective method of thermal utilization of post-curing smoke by using heated with natural gas boiler. Before the smoke enters the boiler, water vapors undergo condensation and the water drops obtained are separated in steam drier. The smoke introduced into the boiler brings some excess of air. Results: After the new method of curing smoke after-burning had been put into practice in PPHU Duda-Bis, the unpleasant odorous and harmful to the environment compounds were eliminated. The content of the emitted components per year, after thermal utilization of the smoke, was 100 times lower in comparison to the wet-method. Conclusion: The thermal methods belong to the most efficient BAT techniques enabling removal of the unpleasant odorous substances from the gases generated by meat industry.

Measuring circular-economy progress requires indicators to examine the implementation of management systems. A complex quality indicator for assessing production systems at the circular-economy micro level was proposed. One innovative aspect of this evaluation of quality indicators is the classification of a set of sixty selected options divided into four core groups (technical, environmental, economic, and social). The second one is the use of a trimmed-mean method to summarize the individual options score into core groups and complex circular-economy indicators of analyzed production systems. The individual options were weighed according to indices defined by the professional team. Here is presented a case study of the use of developed complex quality indicators, including a comparison of two sodium tripolyphosphate production processes. The calculated indicator of the new method was higher, at 204.8%, than the indicator of the old method. This confirms the significant advantage of the new technology.

Recently, the increased consumption of poultry meat in the EU has been observed. Short cycle of poultry meat production allows adjusting the level of production to demand. With the increase in the meat production the amount of generated waste that has to be disposed because they pose a risk to the environment also increases. The work presents the possibility to produce a mixture of feathers, meat-bone meal and poultry litter that can be used for energy purposes (alternative fuel). Moreover, the composition of the ashes after combustion will be similar to phosphorus-potassium fertilizers offered for sale. The resulting granules are characterized by a calorific value in the range 13.1–13.3 kJg-1. The ash after its combustion contained 11.33–13.38% of phosphorous, 4.94–5.67% of potassium, 31.85–32.69% of calcium and 2.07–2.51% of magnesium. Moreover, the ash contained 0.45-0.46% of iron, 0.10–0.11% of manganese, 0.11–0.14 of zinc and 0.02% of copper. Mineral combusted residue of this type of granules has a low content of heavy metals and can be used as an additive to fertilizers and soil improvers, in order to enrich their composition in valuable macro- and micronutrients.