Ukrainian cities are switching to waste heating
In Zhytomyr they intend to build a thermal power plant with a capacity of up to 40 megawatts, one power unit of which will run on wood chips, and the other on RDF fuel, which is produced from recycled waste.
Zhitomir Mayor Sergei Sukhomlin announced this, PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“The implementation of all these projects will reduce gas consumption during the heating season to 7–8 million cubic meters,” Sukhomlin said in an interview with the Kyiv online publication Zerkalo Nedeli.
The mayor explained that Zhytomyr produces 100 thousand tons of garbage per year, from which it can produce 35 thousand tons of fuel.
He agrees that there is a lot of garbage in every city.
“Say, the Dnieper produces about 400 thousand tons of waste per year, therefore, it can produce about 150 thousand tons of RDF granules. And if Dnepr builds a thermal power plant that runs on RDF, it will provide a third of the city with heat and light from its own garbage and will reduce the harm that landfills cause to the environment,” the mayor believes.
In addition, he claims that the implementation of the project will save budget funds by about a third, since there will be a reduction in the need for expensive imported gas.
“Zhytomyr, with its population of a quarter of a million people, saves 20 million cubic meters of gas. Saves for the whole country. This is about 30 million dollars.
Please note that Naftogaz must purchase gas for, say, $1500 per thousand cubic meters, and then sell it to schools, kindergartens and hospitals for $500. Plus subsidies to the population. Losses for every thousand cubic meters are about $1000 at current prices. Therefore, the transition to local fuel, which is literally underfoot, is extremely important for Ukraine,” summed up Sukhomlin.
Ukrainian cities are switching to waste-fired heating.