| Summary: | The research presented in this dissertation focuses on the waste management techniques currently used by Chevron-Escravos Nigeria Limited (CENL), as background knowledge of the existing waste disposal system practiced by the company. Investigation has shown that more than four tons (4tons) of organic food waste that CENL generates daily is being disposed of by using incineration and landfilling of the resulting residues. The high recoverability and economic values in form of nutrients and stored energy is not being considered. The main dissertation problem was to develop an alternative means of promoting the economic and environmental recoverability of these huge amounts of organic wastes, by developing a disposal technique other than the current incineration and landfill methods.
The mechanism considered to achieve this objective was laid out in the customized organic waste converter or processor that provides one of the baselines for this dissertation. It also presents a procedural description of converting organic food waste to bio-feeds and feedstock of high quality. This alternative processing and utilization of organic food waste was carried out to provide information about tradeoffs to the current practice of incineration and landfill management systems. This was done to guide decision making and to serve as a framework within which the plausibility of the proposed solution could be examined. A comparative analysis of the two scenarios of waste to feed and waste to incineration system, the environmental impact, economic viability, and opportunity cost of recycling organic food waste produce of animal bio-feed was assessed by using: • Life cycle analysis (LCA)
• By-products Breakeven Sale Product (BBSP) model. The BBSP model evaluates the opportunity of recycling the organic food waste in production of animal bio-feed to waste incineration. The outcome of the dissertation indicates that incineration is an important contributor to human and environmental toxicity and global warming. The proposed solution (recycling approach) balances the socio-economic, political and environmental safety by producing renewable, clean and eco-friendly feed and by-products. It was also concluded that there are alternative possibilities for the utilization of industrial organic food waste, where both the energy and nutrients are completely utilized, rather than the norms of conversion through chemical, biological, and thermal or other forms of energy fuels), which typically utilizes only one of these (calorific contents) categories at a time. The above mentioned utilization can be achieved by transforming the current waste disposal system. By introducing an alternative model for the recycling of plant and animal nutrients and the utilization of energy, renewable energy can be saved, human health and the environment can be protect and a sustainable economy can be maintained. In summary, it was demonstrated that there is huge capital losses and environmental contamination due to the current waste management practices. Recycling of OF W for feed production would be cost effective method that contributes towards protecting the environment achieving economic sustainability. === Thesis (M.Ing. (Development and Management Engineering))--North-West University, Potchefstroom Campus, 2009.
|
|---|
