[SOUND]

A discussion of biofuels would not be

complete if we didn't talk about refuse.

Things that we don't want.

One of them is a clear, obvious one.

Which is wet refuse, human waste.

We have elaborate systems in place to collect it.

Why don't we use it as an energy source?

Well, a couple of the reasons might be fairly obvious.

[LAUGH] It's disgusting.

[LAUGH] It's filled with bacteria.

But most importantly it's wet.

Our whole waste systems work on taking this all in water, and

these go to waste treatment plants, which then have bacteria which break this down

into some type of water that hopefully can be reused or put back into the ecosystem.

And a type of sludge in the end.

That sludge you could dry and maybe, maybe has enough carbon content to burn.

But if it has any useful carbon content,

perhaps just using it as fill or as fertilizer, might be better.

The whole process of taking that and then saying, hey,

let's back it in the pellets so we can all stick in with burning stones.

Yeah, forget about it.

However, the other stuff we throw away.

The dry refuse, the garbage.

Americans are particularly good at making garbage.

It's about 1 kilogram per person per day.

What about that stuff?

Can we pick all that up, which we're paying people to do anyway, and

instead of taking it to a landfill and you take it to an incinerator.

Burn it and then use that energy to do what we normally do with a heat source.

You boil water.

Turn it into steam.

Steam turns to turbine.

Turbine turns in generator and you got electricity.

Or if you live in a dent city you just take a steam and it's winter time and

you run it through buildings and use that to warm up the buildings.

Why not just incinerate all of our garbage would that be a great energy source?

Well, it turns out that we do get

about one half of one percent of our energy in the United States from that.

Half of the quan comes from burning municipal waste.

Municipal waste incineration.

And for some time, this was a growing filed.

Wow, we the garbage anyway.

Let's get energy out of it.

Then people started notice saying that the things people put in

garbage are probably not some of the best things you want to burn.

Batteries, a variety of heavy metals

were all going in to the air creating air pollution.

And, of course, once it creates air pollution, that then becomes a problem for

the rest of us.

So of course the government steps in and says, hey, clean air act.

Stuff coming out of your smoke stacks.

You can't have this content.

You can't put these things in.

You can't have these carcinogens.

We've got to cut down on it.

Those regulations caused many plants to close and many others to put on

relatively expensive pollution controls.

In fact, the expense of converting municipal solid waste into energy,

is that a point today where no plants have been built since 1995

that's the last 20 years no one has taken that economic equation and

said, this is what we should do with our waste.

Part of the reason for

that is there are much better things to do with the waste than just burn it.

Those places that needed to honor the clean air act and

not shut down did so predominantly by having sorting systems.

It's very hard to convince the consumers that you don't throw

everything into one garbage can.

I've been in Japan.

People there do it much, much better.

They have little different color bags,

from a different sortable commodities, makes it recycling much easier.

And certainly in the US there's still many beans that sort recyclings.

And that's great.

If you're going to end up burning it all you can't just trust that everyone put

the right thing in the right bean.

So you still need some process to sort it.

This type of sorting is of course best done with the human mind.

You can tell what is a can, and what's paper that can be used, and

what's cardboard and what's plastic.

There are machines that can do it.

They're not infallible and they're also expensive.

If you do all the sorting,

then you can end up with something in the end that, it's pretty clean.

You can burn it without the pollution problems.

And you know what?

If I've done all the sorting, and I've already taken out the predominant

combustible material in our trash which is paper and packaging and cardboard, and

I've taken that out already, why burn it?

Why not recycle it?

Turn it into future paper products.

There's a market for it.

The people will pay, companies will pay, for giant bales of high quality paper.

They'll pay a bit less for giant bales of cardboard.

This stuff, instead of trees, can go right back into making more paper product.

If you sort out the aluminum that's really cost efficient.

Making a can from an old can takes about five percent

of the energy that it would take to make a can from scratch from aluminum ore.

Plastics, you're going to sold out the plastic, sure,

you can burn the plastics, but instead let's make new plastic out of them.

Again, there is an energy saving.

So if you do the sorting right, you've got the recyclable paper,

you've got the recyclable plastic, you've got the recycle law metals.

And what's left is, I don't know.

The old spaghetti noodles and the orange pills.

That's stuff is not the best stuff to burn anyway because it's wet.

First, you have to spend a lot of energy to make it dry and dry off the water and

then you can finally burn.

If you get down into that level of the wet refuse burying it into a land field,

is actually quite easy it will rot and decay away and just give you soil.

In the US, there are 86 operating Municipal Solid Waste Incinerators.

These all comply with Federal Air Standards and

quality standards, even so in some of these cities and towns.

You can still smell them.

Maybe it's not as unpleasant as smelling the wet refuse collection facility,

but it is still a noticeable problem.

And one where most municipalities,

even if the economics were such that, we can make some money off this.

But do you really want a smelly incinerator in the middle of your city?

Probably not.

So you build it way out on the edge of your city.

Of course,

then you have a lot more transportation cost to get everything out to it.

sort of the waste.

Recycle the waste.

What's left?

Probably just perfectly fine to bury in the dirt.

When you're sorting trash you could use giant mechanical machines.

These are expensive And they're not nearly as good as using people.

Let's go to our trash sorting station here at the University of Illinois, and

see how they do it.

[NOISE] Here we are at the waste transfer station

at the University of Illinois, with my friend, and

the director of this facility, Tracy Osby.

>> Okay, here at the waste transfer station, we're standing at South bay.

And this is where the process starts for our sorting.

We have the Zskipster that come and actually push the trash, and

the recycle items onto the in feed belt.

And from the in feed belt, it goes up the line through the sorting belt.

>> So all the trash of the university, gets dumped here on your doorstep,

correct?

>> Pretty much. 95% of it.

>> 95% of the trash in the university.

But then I noticed there's like this desk.

There's some things you just pull out because they can be recycled

in a different manner?

>> Yes, such as the copper that you see that's right there to your left there.

>> Okay.

>> A lot of the wooden tools, such as we have a snow shovel, an actual fence.

>> [LAUGH] >> [LAUGH] Rake.

We have those items that we pull out of here, so.

>> Okay, okay.

Now on campus, there's also things that are marked recycling,

like cans here, and bottles here.

Does that just get dumped in here too?

Containers, yep, containers they are actually emptied in here as well.

What happens inside those containers, those items are actually,

they're actually placed in a blue recycle bag, and I don't see any-

>> I see a couple blue.

>> This one right here, here's one right here.

You see that blue recycle bag there?

That bag there, it lets us know, automatic,

that it's actually recycled materials inside of that bag.

>> Okay. >> So that bag there,

it's what's placed inside, like the pop bottle and

a can container, >> Uh-huh.

>> Placed inside it. So we know exactly that's recycle.

>> Go it.

>> Yep, we know off the top, that's recycle.

>> Okay.

So I shouldn't feel too bad if I take my aluminum can, and

just throw it in any trash bin Because chances are it's going to come here and

get pulled out anyway.

>> Yes it will come here and probably get pulled out anyway,

but we have special bins for those, that would like for everyone to place it,

and to recycle in bulk makes it easier.

>> That's right, to make his job, and the people working for

him easier, put your cans and bottles in the proper containers.

>> Yes, makes it easier.

>> [LAUGH] >> All right, so here we are.

The trash comes up through this line.

Now, tell me what happens to it next.

>> This is actually the sorting line,

and we have our staff, the DSC staff which is Developmental Service Center.

They would actually go through and sort that all of our recyclable items.

Such as the paper, the cardboard, the aluminum can, and the plastics.

>> Okay. >> We will get those items sorted

out here, and

they will drop down in the chutes that are pretty much underneath us, okay?

>> So I see some, there's a plastic bottle.

Okay, so that goes in the plastic bin.

>> Yes. >> And there's another plastic.

The one person.

This guy is doing plastic.

Someone else picks out the cans.

Is that how it works?

>> Well you also have plastic that's being done on that side over there, and

he's actually doing aluminum cans as well.

>> And he's doing cans there.

>> Yeah. >> I see.

>> The first two guys at the front here, they're picking out your cardboard.

They're getting whatever plastics they can as well.

>> Okay so down here, you can see ah-ha, we're getting the cardboard,

we're getting the paper.

>> Yes.

>> Yeah, man, there's lots of paper in there, right?

>> Yeah. >> So that's all going to get picked out,

and thrown in the right bin too?

>> Right. The paper get picked out.

It goes down that way, but right now he's grabbing more of the cardboard,

which is going underneath the bottom here.

>> Now I see some glass going through.

What do you guys do with glass?

>> Glass is not a high commodity item that we recycle here on the campus.

>> Yeah. >> We don't get

a lot of glass on this campus.

The most glass we get is pretty much during possibly tailgating season.

>> Right.

Glass bottles, right?

>> Right. A lot of glass, and beer bottles, and

things of that nature.

But for the most part, we don't get a lot of glass on this campus.

All the vending machines, and things of that nature, pretty much plastic bottles.

>> Right.

And also the economics of glass,

I don't really think that you get any benefit from recycling it, right?

You can make it out of sand just as easily as that.

>> Well you can get it, it's not much of a lot of benefit to it.

But at the same time, it would divert it from going to the landfill.

And that's the whole program,

is to divert everything from going to the landfill as much as we can.

>> Okay. >> Yeah.

>> So, what you're seeing,

is that the stuff that has already been sorted, is now getting compacted.

Because it's all about the economics and transportation.

And if you can transport this stuff when it's all compressed,

you got less transport costs, right?

>> Exactly.

What you're seeing here pretty much, are in these clear liners that's down here

within this bay, which is this is the North bay.

These items are coming from dining or housing.

They pre-sort.

>> Okay. >> So at their facility, what they have,

is they have a container for cardboard.

>> Mm-hm. >> And they have extra containers for

their plastic, aluminum cans, and paper.

>> Okay.

>> So we pick those up on an actual routine schedule that we pick up from

dining services, so to speak.

>> So this is almost all just the food waste

trash stuff- >> Excatly.

>> That you can't recycle anyway.

>> Exactly. What's coming out of the compactor.

This is pretty much what's coming through.

All the plastic bottles and aluminum cans that we pick up from housing areas, and

all the housing facilities.

They're already pre-sorted.

>> Okay. >> They're pre-sorted in 90 gallon totes.

>> Great. >> So we pick those items up, and

those items are brought here to the waste transfer station, and

emptied into the South bay.

>> Right. >> Where it goes through the sorting line.

But we don't want to send food material.

>> No. >> Food products,

through the actual sorting line.

>> Makes sense.

>> Yeah.

>> So the line's above us, and the stuff falls through here,

and i see this is the paper.

Are there different kinds of paper that you worry about?

>> Well no. The paper is pretty much okay with this,

except for probably laminate.

>> Okay.

>> The lamination of paper, and things of that nature.

Here we have the two bays, with the two bays and

the paper that falls out between two bays.

The sorting line actually pulls everything that comes down to this portion.

And that goes back to on this side over here.

We have here the plastic bottles.

[INAUDIBLE] to allow the liquid to drain, so

when it's drained out [INAUDIBLE] it compacts it tighter,

with less fluids going through it.

>> Okay. >> Just East of that,

you have the container for the aluminum cans.

And the cans fill up pretty fast as well.

There is no reason to actually perforate the cans.

>> Okay.

>> So the cans are placed in a container as well.

>> And then I see we've got lots, and lots of cardboard.

>> Cardboard, hot tamale.

>> Really? >> Cardboard, we do quite a bit.

You get a lot of cardboard all the time.

>> Okay.

>> It has its peak seasons, where you got a lot of cardboard at times.

And sometimes you don't get a lot of cardboard.

And the peak season determines on the price of the cardboard.

>> Holiday season, the price of cardboard goes down pretty much.

>> Because everyone has it.

>> Everyone has [CROSSTALK] >> Everyone

bought a box of Christmas presents.

>> It's plentiful.

>> Right, right, okay. [CROSSTALK]

>> It's a lot of cardboard.

So that's what happens with the cardboard.

>> All right, so now, you take the stuff that's sorted,

and you take your nice Zkipster trucks, >> True.

>> And you push it into this pit over here.

So it looks like you're ready to bale some paper next, right?

>> Yes, what the guys are doing right now, they are actually going through this paper

to clean out all the items that shouldn't be here.

I mean, such as right here, you can see the plastic right here.

>> Yeah, yeah.

You see, my guys were normally pull this plastic out of here,

provided they can see it.

So they have to kind of flip the paper.

Okay. >> Using.

So what happens here, they're going to go though this paper and pull out anything

that shouldn't be here such as aluminum cans, plastic bottles, possibly cardboard.

>> Right. >> Maybe even glass.

>> Right, sort of like a last chance sorting, right?

>> Correct.

>> And then the paper falls into this machine, and

then this machine does the compression magic, right?

>> Well actually, the skids are actually pushing aside the conveyor pit,-

>> Okay.

>> And from this conveyor pit, which it takes it on the belt and

takes it straight up to the baler, and once it goes through the baler there,

the baler will take it and compress it to the actual pounds that it should be.

Pretty much the paper is weighing between the average of

12 to 1,400 pounds per bale.

>> 12 to 1,400 pounds per bale?

>> Per bale, that's one bale. >> Wow, wow.

>> Pretty heavy.

>> Yeah, yeah, 500 kilograms.

>> Hey, I can move it.

[LAUGH] >> Okay, so these are the bales.

Wow.

This is like 1,200, 1,400 pounds right?

>> Yeah, yeah.

>> Man. >> We could move it, you and

I could move it.

>> No. No way. >> It's some where between 12 to 1,400 pounds, but

this is the paper bales that we have, and to load a truck load of

paper bales you're looking probably maybe 33 to 34 bales of paper.

>> How much do you get for that?

>> Well that's going to be based on a price.

Right now I'm going to say the paper is actually right

at $120 per ton, I'm going to say.

>> $120 a ton.

>> And a truck load that goes at is about 40,000 pounds.

>> Okay, that's 20 tons so- >> Yeah,so that's 20 that's like

the minimum.

>> $2500, $3000 >> Yeah,

that's the minimum load, you know.

>> Okay.

>> And of course the quality of the paper determines a lot, you know,

the less news print inside the papers mean the higher dollars you get for it.

>> Right so you want this kind of stuff, right?

This is someone's- >> Yeah.

>> Wow. This is applied physics letters.

>> [LAUGH] Pamphlets.

>> Pamphlets, right, and cardboard, cardboard bales.

>> Yep, here are the cardboard bales.

Cardboards right now is roughly going for

probably about 90, I'm going to say about $90 per ton.

>> Okay. >> So it's pretty-

>> So less than the paper, right?

>> Less than a paper, but actually same weight as a paper.

>> Okay. >> So this is still 1,200 to 1,400 pounds,

there we go.

That's what you have, and it takes the same-

>> And how much, how many bales of paper

do you think you get per day and how many cardboard per day?

Do you have an idea?

>> It would vary.

>> Okay. >> Depending on what's taking place on

the campus at times campus is super busy.

>> Right. >> And at times the campus is

not super busy.

Right about now on average the guys are probably doing

probably about six bales of cardboard per day, if not more.

>> Per day, wow.

>> Per day, if not more.

>> Okay. >> Right now for

paper, paper could be about the same between six.

>> Yeah, and all this thought that we are in some paperless university and

everything's electronic.

Yeah, sure.

>> Yeah, we're trying.

We're trying to get that.

>> [LAUGH] >> I'll tell you what,

back when I first started here over in December 2009.

>> Yeah.

>> We did quite a bit more, paper per day.

>> So maybe the paperless campus is actually working here,

paper is going down.

>> I can guarantee you it's working.

>> Working, that's good.

>> Paper's actually going down.

We don't get as much paper as we used to.

When I first started here December 2009,

paper bales you're talking probably 15, 16 paper bales per day.

>> Wow, and now we're down to five or six.

>> Yeah, between four and six per day that we work here.

>> That's really good.

>> It's actually working.

But at times, it's kind of hard to tell because you get a professor who's been

here for 30 years and he or she is moving out.

>> I've been here for 30 years.

[LAUGH] >> And they decided to clean out their

attic, and they have all these files here, and they have to sort through the files in

the department before they can actually send them to me.

>> So all those papers sitting in my office will eventually end up

in one of these bails?

>> Yeah, yeah, yeah. >> [SOUND]

>> Good job.

All right, so this is the real money,

the aluminum cans.

>> Yeah, this is the kind you really watch.

[LAUGH] >> Yeah, yeah, yeah.

>> [LAUGH] >> So

how much is a bale of aluminum cans weigh and how much does it cost?

>> Aluminum cans, along with plastic bottles,

their bales are between six to 800 pounds.

>> Okay. >> because they're a lighter in

weight outside of the paper and the cardboard, okay?

>> Got it, got it.

>> Right now, the aluminum cans are actually selling for

roughly around $0.76 per pound.

>> So just some quick math, that's $1,500 a ton and

that's ten times cardboard.

>> Yes and paper.

>> And paper.

Right, 10 times paper, 20 times cardboard.

>> Yeah yeah.

>> Wow okay aluminum cans.

Wow there's a lot of them?

>> Yeah this is basically used as a storage trailer to actually store them on

until we actually sell.

We have not sold any more for, it's been a while since I sold all of them.

>> because you wait for the price to go up.

>> That's right, wait for it to rise up. >> Yeah, yeah.

>> We gotta look out for the best interest of the university.

>> Best interest of the university.

How many ton?

How many bales of cans do you got?

>> Well cans, we would have to look at the figures far as those being collected and

sold, so to speak.

Right now with me just collecting them, I haven't sold any in quite some time, so

therefore I can't give you an exact number on the cans as of right now.

>> Okay.

>> It's easy to calculate the figures once you have actually collected the items and

then you sell them- >> Sell them and

you see when the last time you sold them was.

>> But right now I haven't sold any in quite a while, so we're actually sitting

on it waiting for the prices to get a little bit higher, you know.

>> Yeah, yeah, we got like can broker guy here.

Okay.

So the plastic has gone from something that used to be wow

plastic we can recycle it, and now, this is the cheapest, right?

You get less money from this than you do from the paper, the cardboard, right?

>> Exactly.

Exactly.

>> Okay. >> Although we get quite a bit of it.

We recycle a lot of the plastic that comes through here, and

right now we kind of recycle, I have two choices to

recycle this through Resource Management which is out of Plainfield, Illinois or

we can actually recycle through Midwest Fiber which is out of Plumpton, Illinois.

>> So you have some competition of who you can sell it to?

>> Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

>> Okay.

>> We have competition for the paper to cardboard as well.

>> Yeah.

>> And aluminum cans is about the same, it's no competition.

>> No competition.

>> Yeah, the competition for aluminum cans is pretty much the same.

Coca Cola, and Anheuser-Busch.

>> Okay. [LAUGH] The Borg collective of cans.

>> This is my overflow which is outside here.

>> Well it's not going to rust.

>> Well, well hey.

>> [LAUGH] >> And even though it's aluminum cans, and

it's sitting out here, and it's only 6 to 800 pounds, we can't move this one either.

>> No no, you need a machine.

>> I wouldn't try. I wouldn't try.

>> No.

>> Yeah these are trash trailers and we fill at least one of these per day.

During move in and move out we fill two of these per day and with a few open pans.

But we fill at least one trailer per day, and this is a trash trailer.

Right now it goes over to Brickyard Landfill, which is in Danville, Illinois,

because those are the people that have the contract now for it.

So we contract that service out to actually Allied Waste right now,

which is Republic Waste, same company, so to speak.

But they sub contract it out to the people who haul the trailers,

which is KRD trucking.

So they haul the trailers over to the Brickyard Landfill, which is in Danville,

Illinois.

>> So now one trailer like this,

trash needs compacted because otherwise you're taking too many trucks.

So they fill this up to like the 22 tons or something right?

>> Correct, correct, correct.

We don't exceed 80,000 pounds.

We can't exceed 80 so that's about where we stand with those.

>> And now unlike the aluminum, and the plastic, and the cardboard, and the paper

which you get money for, Alleging have to pay money to the land fill to take that.

>> Correct.

>> So just what's the economics of that.

How much do they charge for a trailer?

>> Right now you're looking at pretty much about $30 per tonne.

>> $30 per tonne to have them bury it?

>> Correct.

>> Yeah.

So on the economic question,

you're bringing in a lot of things that you then sell.

You have to obviously pay, that's a tremendous service.

But how does it come out in end of the day?

Is this a cash revenue enterprise?

>> It's more of a benefit to the waster transfer station.

To help offset the budget for here.

>> Okay. >> So it's not.

An actual profit that we would make because you have to keep in mind

with the up keep and the maintenance of the trucks and stuff that we have.

>> Sure. >> The few

cost >> Right.

And the army of people that actually go pick up all

the trash >> Correct.

>> From a whole campus >> Correct.

>> Of 45,000 people and bring it here.

>> Sure.

>> And you have to look at the sorting process we go through too.

>> Sure. >> And the capital equipment.

>> And in maintenance and in upkeep of the equipment.

And it's at times when the maintenance can get real tense sometimes.

It's tight spaces to work here.

>> But clearly, doing all this is so much more cost efficient.

And environmentally

efficient than just baring it all.

>> Key word, yes.

Divert it from going to the landfill.

>> Exactly, so there go my thirty years worth of files?

>> Yes, your thirty years worth of files that you chose to hold onto.

>> [LAUGH] >> Now we have them here at the waste

transfer station and as you can see the.

Excuses actually pushing iodine to the conveyor belt here in the pit.

And after they've sorted through to make sure there wasn't any aluminum cans and

plastic bottles in there.

>> Right, right.

>> And this is actually going to be sorted up through the line,

if it goes through the line, he's still sorting as you can see, pickup

>> Yeah, just in case.

>> Just in case anything got missed.

And then as it goes up through the inside here, and

then drop down stuff go to inside here.

As it drops in the baler, the baler drops it down to the bottom top compressed.

>> Okay, so this machine, it crushes it, it compacts everything and

then it actually bales it and puts it in your final form ready for delivery.

>> And in a process of bailing, as it comes out, it puts these straps around it.

It straps it up to hold it in place.

That's what keeps it tight.

Without the straps, there's no bale.

>> Everything falls apart.

>> because it'll fall right apart as soon as it comes out of there.

>> Neat. Neat.

>> There we go.

>> Awesome machines.

>> Excellent machines.

>> Wow. So here comes one of the bales of paper.

>> Yeah. This is your

bale that's going to come out here.

>> All right.

The ram is pushing it.

>> Ram is pushing it out, as it comes out you're going to see the strap.

The strap's over there.

>> Right, right.

Because if you don't put a strap on it it'll all fall apart.

>> There it goes.

This is our finished product.

>> Yeah, yeah.

One more.

Here's your bale.

>> Here we go.

>> All set and ready to go.

>> Yeah.

You feel how tight this is?

>> Yeah. Nothing is coming out of here.

It's a very tight bail.

>> 30 years of files.

That's where they end up.

>> Right here.

>> When you get all that trash, instead of taking it to the landfill,

can you burn it instead?

Can you do it like municipal salad waste?

>> No. >> No.

>> No.

>> Tell me why.

>> I think that's going to damage our Earth.

That's going to be pollution.

[CROSSTALK] You don't want to breathe that.

>> So even though you could get energy content out of burning what's left over

that you don't recycle it's just not worth it in terms of the air quality and

the environmental regulations you'd have to do to burn it cleanly.

>> Why I don't, I don't want to say you can't burn it, so to speak.

But it's going to be a process and

procedures that you would have to follow to actually be able to burn it.

Example, they're plastics.

Do you know that the plastics that we recycle here-

>> You don't want to burn those.

>> You could burn those, and they burn them.

And they use it for fuel.

So, they have a machine that IFCC is kind of working on,

to actually get that in place, so that they can actually burn that for fuel.

>> Right. >> But it's a process you have to follow,

those processes I'm not familiar with at this time, but we are looking in

>> Can't do that.

I'm working with ISTC on a few things.

>> Because clearly the best burnable stuff is paper but

you get much more money from recycling it than you ever would from the energy you

would save or create by actually burning it.

And all the wet waste and the food garbage >> The energy content for

burning that's probably not much because you gotta dry it all first, right?

>> Yeah. >> It's wet.

>> Yeah, that's the process.

I'm not familiar with the entire process, but there's a process for it.

>> That's what you need to know about recycling products

at the waste transfer station.

>> Here at the University of Illinois.

>> There we go.

[MUSIC]

Energy from Garbage

Energy, Environment, and Everyday Life

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