IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jeners/v13y2020i11p2786-d365905.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Potentiality of Waste-to-Energy Sector Coupling in the MENA Region: Jordan as a Case Study

Author

Listed:
  • Qahtan Thabit

    (Department of Waste and Resource Management, Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, University of Rostock, D-18059 Rostock, Germany)

  • Abdallah Nassour

    (Department of Waste and Resource Management, Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, University of Rostock, D-18059 Rostock, Germany)

  • Michael Nelles

    (Department of Waste and Resource Management, Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, University of Rostock, D-18059 Rostock, Germany
    Deutsches Biomasseforschungszentrum GmbH, D-04347 Leipzig, Germany)

Abstract

Population growth, urbanization, and changes in lifestyle have led to an increase in waste generation quantities. The waste management system in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is still considered an adolescent system, while developed countries have made great progress in this field, including regulation, financing, administration, separation at source, recycling, and converting waste to energy. At the same time, in the MENA region, the best performance of the recycling process is around 7–10% of total waste. Nowadays, many developed countries like Germany are shifting from waste management to material flow systems, which represent the core of a circular economy. Also, it should be stated here that all countries that have a robust and integrated waste management system include waste-to-energy (W-to-E) incineration plants in their solutions for dealing with residual waste, which is still generated after passing through the entire treatment cycle (hierarchy). Therefore, this paper illustrates the potentiality of embedding waste incineration plants in the MENA region, especially in large cities, and addressing the economic and financial issues for the municipalities. Cities in these countries would like to build and operate waste treatment plants; however, municipalities do not have the sustainable investment and operating costs. The solution is to maximize the income from the output, such as energy, recycling materials, etc. In addition, the MENA region is facing another dilemma, which is water scarcity due to climate change, increasing evaporation, and reduction of precipitation. This research illustrates a simulated model for a waste incineration plant in the MENA region. The EBSILON 13.2 software package was used to achieve this process. Furthermore, the simulated plant applies the concept of waste-to-energy-to-water, so that not only is waste converted to energy but, by efficient usage of multi-stage flash (MSF) technology, this system is able to generate 23 MWe of electric power and 8500 m 3 /day of potable water. A cost analysis was also implemented to calculate the cost of thermal treatment of each ton of municipal solid waste (MSW) during the life span of the plant. It was found that the average cost of treatment over 30 years would be around US$39/ton.

Suggested Citation

  • Qahtan Thabit & Abdallah Nassour & Michael Nelles, 2020. "Potentiality of Waste-to-Energy Sector Coupling in the MENA Region: Jordan as a Case Study," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(11), pages 1-19, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:13:y:2020:i:11:p:2786-:d:365905
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/13/11/2786/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/13/11/2786/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Malinauskaite, J. & Jouhara, H. & Czajczyńska, D. & Stanchev, P. & Katsou, E. & Rostkowski, P. & Thorne, R.J. & Colón, J. & Ponsá, S. & Al-Mansour, F. & Anguilano, L. & Krzyżyńska, R. & López, I.C. & , 2017. "Municipal solid waste management and waste-to-energy in the context of a circular economy and energy recycling in Europe," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 2013-2044.
    2. Pirotta, F.J.C. & Ferreira, E.C. & Bernardo, C.A., 2013. "Energy recovery and impact on land use of Maltese municipal solid waste incineration," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 49(C), pages 1-11.
    3. Sharaf Eldean, Mohamed A. & Soliman, A.M., 2017. "A novel study of using oil refinery plants waste gases for thermal desalination and electric power generation: Energy, exergy & cost evaluations," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 195(C), pages 453-477.
    4. Silva, Leo Jaymee de Vilas Boas da & Santos, Ivan Felipe Silva dos & Mensah, Johnson Herlich Roslee & Gonçalves, Andriani Tavares Tenório & Barros, Regina Mambeli, 2020. "Incineration of municipal solid waste in Brazil: An analysis of the economically viable energy potential," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 1386-1394.
    5. Gómez, Antonio & Zubizarreta, Javier & Rodrigues, Marcos & Dopazo, César & Fueyo, Norberto, 2010. "Potential and cost of electricity generation from human and animal waste in Spain," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 35(2), pages 498-505.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Qahtan Thabit & Abdallah Nassour & Michael Nelles, 2022. "Facts and Figures on Aspects of Waste Management in Middle East and North Africa Region," Waste, MDPI, vol. 1(1), pages 1-29, November.
    2. Matthias Maldet & Daniel Schwabeneder & Georg Lettner & Christoph Loschan & Carlo Corinaldesi & Hans Auer, 2022. "Beyond Traditional Energy Sector Coupling: Conserving and Efficient Use of Local Resources," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(12), pages 1-36, June.
    3. Nour El Houda Chaher & Safwat Hemidat & Qahtan Thabit & Mehrez Chakchouk & Abdallah Nassour & Moktar Hamdi & Michael Nelles, 2020. "Potential of Sustainable Concept for Handling Organic Waste in Tunisia," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(19), pages 1-31, October.
    4. Anna Kurbatova & Hani Ahmed Abu-Qdais, 2020. "Using Multi-Criteria Decision Analysis to Select Waste to Energy Technology for a Mega City: The Case of Moscow," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(23), pages 1-18, November.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ionica Oncioiu & Sorinel Căpuşneanu & Dan Ioan Topor & Marius Petrescu & Anca-Gabriela Petrescu & Monica Ioana Toader, 2020. "The Effective Management of Organic Waste Policy in Albania," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(16), pages 1-16, August.
    2. Xu, Jiuping & Huang, Yidan & Shi, Yi & Li, Ruolan, 2022. "Reverse supply chain management approach for municipal solid waste with waste sorting subsidy policy," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    3. Dek Vimean Pheakdey & Nguyen Van Quan & Tran Dang Xuan, 2023. "Economic and Environmental Benefits of Energy Recovery from Municipal Solid Waste in Phnom Penh Municipality, Cambodia," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(7), pages 1-19, April.
    4. Marina Moreira & Ivan Felipe Silva Santos & Lilian Ferreira Freitas & Flávio Ferreira Freitas & Regina Mambeli Barros & Geraldo Lúcio Tiago Filho, 2022. "Energy and economic analysis for a desalination plant powered by municipal solid waste incineration and natural gas in Brazil," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 24(2), pages 1799-1826, February.
    5. Afonso R. G. Azevedo & Alan Marinho Costa & Daiane Cecchin & Carlos Rodrigues Pereira & Markssuel Teixeira Marvila & Adeyemi Adesina, 2022. "Economic potential comparative of reusing different industrial solid wastes in cementitious composites: a case study in Brazil," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 24(4), pages 5938-5961, April.
    6. Rodrigues, Livia Fernanda & Santos, Ivan Felipe Silva dos & Santos, Thereza Isabelle Silva dos & Barros, Regina Mambeli & Tiago Filho, Geraldo Lúcio, 2022. "Energy and economic evaluation of MSW incineration and gasification in Brazil," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 188(C), pages 933-944.
    7. Zhai, Jihua & Burke, Ian T. & Stewart, Douglas I., 2021. "Beneficial management of biomass combustion ashes," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    8. Cudjoe, Dan & Wang, Hong & zhu, Bangzhu, 2022. "Thermochemical treatment of daily COVID-19 single-use facemask waste: Power generation potential and environmental impact analysis," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 249(C).
    9. Corina Pelau & Alexandra Catalina Chinie, 2018. "Econometric Model for Measuring the Impact of the Education Level of the Population on the Recycling Rate in a Circular Economy," The AMFITEATRU ECONOMIC journal, Academy of Economic Studies - Bucharest, Romania, vol. 20(48), pages 340-340.
    10. Halkos, George & Managi, Shunsuke, 2023. "New developments in the disciplines of environmental and resource economics," Economic Analysis and Policy, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 513-522.
    11. Konrad Siegfried & Susann Günther & Sara Mengato & Fabian Riedel & Daniela Thrän, 2023. "Boosting Biowaste Valorisation—Do We Need an Accelerated Regional Implementation of the European Law for End-of-Waste?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(17), pages 1-13, September.
    12. Ogunjuyigbe, A.S.O. & Ayodele, T.R. & Alao, M.A., 2017. "Electricity generation from municipal solid waste in some selected cities of Nigeria: An assessment of feasibility, potential and technologies," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 149-162.
    13. Emmanuel D. Adamides & Konstantinos Georgousoglou & Yannis Mouzakitis, 2023. "Designing a Flexible and Adaptive Municipal Waste Management Organisation Using the Viable System Model," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(18), pages 1-24, September.
    14. Soltanian, Salman & Kalogirou, Soteris A. & Ranjbari, Meisam & Amiri, Hamid & Mahian, Omid & Khoshnevisan, Benyamin & Jafary, Tahereh & Nizami, Abdul-Sattar & Gupta, Vijai Kumar & Aghaei, Siavash & Pe, 2022. "Exergetic sustainability analysis of municipal solid waste treatment systems: A systematic critical review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 156(C).
    15. Bidart, Christian & Fröhling, Magnus & Schultmann, Frank, 2014. "Electricity and substitute natural gas generation from the conversion of wastewater treatment plant sludge," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 404-413.
    16. Zhang, Yuhu & Ren, Jing & Pu, Yanru & Wang, Peng, 2020. "Solar energy potential assessment: A framework to integrate geographic, technological, and economic indices for a potential analysis," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 577-586.
    17. Davor Mance & Siniša Vilke & Borna Debelić, 2020. "Sustainable Governance of Coastal Areas and Tourism Impact on Waste Production: Panel Analysis of Croatian Municipalities," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(18), pages 1-16, September.
    18. Tariq Javed & Fareyha Said & Dalilawati Zainal & Azlina Abdul Jalil, 2024. "Circular Economy Implementation Status of Selected ASEAN Countries," SAGE Open, , vol. 14(1), pages 21582440231, March.
    19. Pere Ariza-Montobbio & Susana Herrero Olarte, 2021. "Socio-metabolic profiles of electricity consumption along the rural–urban continuum of Ecuador: Whose energy sovereignty?," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(5), pages 7961-7995, May.
    20. Marco Abis & Martina Bruno & Kerstin Kuchta & Franz-Georg Simon & Raul Grönholm & Michel Hoppe & Silvia Fiore, 2020. "Assessment of the Synergy between Recycling and Thermal Treatments in Municipal Solid Waste Management in Europe," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(23), pages 1-15, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jeners:v:13:y:2020:i:11:p:2786-:d:365905. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.