HOW

A world’s best practice waste management system is proposed to receive, sort, separate and recycle ACT waste that is currently going to landfill.
CRS can significantly reduce the volume of household, municipal and commercial waste going directly to landfill within 18 months of receiving approval of the Fyshwick recycling and freight rail proposal, called a materials recovery facility (MRF).
The renewable energy project involves a partnership with ActewAGL Retail to provide energy for 14,000 Canberra homes.
Remaining waste residues, after recycling, will be used to generate 15 Mega-watt of electricity baseload power. It would significantly improve the ACT’s energy supply security and reduce our greenhouse gas emissions.

DRAFT ENVIRONMENTAL PLANNING PROCESS

DRAFT ENVIRONMENTAL PLANNING PROCESS

CRS and ActewAGL Retail have announced they will provide two separate EIS documents and applications to the ACT Government.

The first being for the recycling and rail freight terminal components of the project, which is planned to be provided in a draft EIS to the community in 2017.

The second for the renewable energy components of the project, which will be provided in a draft EIS to the community in 2018.

The proposal will be developed and displayed in two separate documents. The recycling and associated rail freight facility proposal, or a materials recovery facility (MRF) will enable CRS to get started on recycling ACT landfilled waste mid-2019.

DRAFT ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT STATEMENTS

The Draft Environmental Impact Statements are being developed as part of a comprehensive planning assessment process.

The ACT Government has issued stringent scoping requirements for the preparation of a statement, and these can be found on the Department of Planning and Environment website.

Community consultation starts early and is an important part of the process. CRS is seeking your ideas and comments to help us prepare the studies into technical, construction, environmental and social factors. We invite people to contact us and have their say on this new green initiative for Canberra by calling 1800 334 696 or sending us a message via the Contact CRS button at the front of this website.

As part of the EIS process detailed air quality, traffic, noise, hydrology, geology, visual impacts, odour, health and bushfire risk studies will be prepared. Experts have been enlisted to prepare the studies for both EIS documents.

The results of all studies will be compiled in each Draft EIS and exhibited for community consideration and response. Community consultation comments for each EIS will then be included in each EIS document, that will go to the ACT Government for consideration.

THE CRS PROJECT PROCESS

SITE LOCATION

CRS PROJECT SNAPSHOT (26 October 2017)

Joint Venture between Benedict Industries and Access Recycling to form Capital Recycling Solutions
Joint Venture between CRS and ActewAGL Retail for the production and sale of the renewable electricity
CRS owns 2 hectares of industrial zoned land at 16 Ipswich St, Fyshwick and is acquiring 1.2 hectares of land adjoining the rail frontage, with access to Lithgow Street
Access Recycling’s yard adjoins the site and allows an additional, already approved, 1.58 hectare of post-processing area, if required
John Holland Rail has already agreed to a lease over the “South Shunt” rail siding, which means we can import and export goods by rail
The project will deliver to Canberra a modern, general freight terminal to load and unload containers onto freight trains
The materials recovery facility is designed for 300,000 tonnes per annum of recycling throughput
Renewable energy currently makes up less than half of ACT’s total electricity use – the ACT Government’s 2020 target is 100% renewably-sourced electricity.
This project will add some 106,000 Mega-watt hrs of renewable energy per year – enough to supply 14,000 homes.

MATERIALS RECOVERY FACILITY (MRF) COMPONENT FACTS AND FIGURES

The facility design is for up to 300,000 tonnes per annum.
Average recycling and recovery rates from municipal solid waste (or ‘red bin’ waste) by these types of facilities – up to 20% by weight.
Average recycling recovery rate from commercial and industrial waste by these types of facilities – more than 20% by weight.
Mugga Lane Landfill is currently accepting 309,000 tonnes per annum.
If constructed and operating by mid-2019, CRS estimates some 300,000 tonnes per annum of waste could be processed for recycling.
After recycling a conservative average of 20% (60,000 tonnes per annum), approximately 240,000 tonnes are called waste residues. These residues are called refuse derived fuel (RDF) and used in renewable energy thermal conversion.
Once approved, the timing of construction, commissioning and meeting compliance conditions of the renewable energy component will be established.
After the renewable energy process the residues are again processed to remove any more recyclables, for example metal. CRS will then export the remaining residues, to the Woodlawn Bioreactor, by proven waste container technology. Rail transport is direct to the Woodlawn’s rail receival facility.
The amount of waste that would transfer to the Fyshwick Centre will vary seasonally, and there may be other disposal options available. There may be a need, even if the renewable energy plant is operating, to continue exporting waste residue to the Woodlawn Bioreactor. This is a significant incentive to recycle as much as commercially possible, to keep this disposal cost to a minimum.
There is no need to accept sewerage sludges or any waste from Sydney or the Sydney region. CRS is confident that this proposal will be able to service the needs of the ACT community and a regional catchment, nominally no greater than a 100km radius from Fyshwick.

RENEWABLE WASTE TO ENERGY (WtE) COMPONENT FACTS AND FIGURES

The proposed energy production capacity is 15 Mega-watt electricity, one plant is proposed.
A 15 Mega-watt electricity plant can take in some 135,000 tonnes per year, or 17.1 tonnes per hour (7880 hours per year).
‘Bottom ash’ is created as the residue leftover from the renewable energy process.
It is expected we can recycle more from the ash. The ash and metals recovered after the thermal conversion process will be some 20,000 tonnes per year.
The emissions management system extracts some 5,400 tonnes per year. This amounts to 4% of the Centre’s waste throughput.
The nett export of energy to the grid is 13.5 Mega-watt of electricity. This can supply power for over 14,000 houses (assuming an average ACT house uses 7470kw/h. This figure is sourced from www.billrepublic.com.au).
There are 145,229 households in Canberra (Source 2012 census).
Some 10 per cent of ACT households could be powered by this proposal.

SUMMARY OF THE OCTOBER 2017 DESIGN UPDATES

The Materials Recovery Facility

CRS has reversed the traffic flow analysis – truck entry is via Lithgow Street and egress is proposed via Ipswich Street.
CRS has relocated the central weighbridges closer to Lithgow Street.
The entry road is relocated between the existing pine trees and the site’s southern boundary.
The shed is now a regular shape.

The Renewable Waste to Energy Component

A single line 15 Mega-watt electricity plant is proposed.
The location of the 132Kva switching station would be to the northern end of the car park – this is the closest point on-site to the existing grid connection point.

Mechanical waste material sorting

For more information about Advanced MRF’s please see www.w-stadler.de or watch the video below.

HOW WOULD THE FACILITY OPERATE?

• Some 60 full-time and 10 part-time jobs are created when the centre is fully operational.
• More than 80 jobs created during construction.
• The Centre’s operating hours would be 24/7, based on three work shifts.
• The materials recovery facility would work in 2 shifts over 6 days (Mon-Sat) from 6.00am to 12.00am.
• The gate opening hours to receive waste would be Monday to Saturday, from 6.00am to 10.00pm and Sundays from 8.00am to 2.00pm.
• Vehicles would first check in at the security controlled gateway to the site. Trucks will be weighed as they enter from Lithgow Street and then proceed into the odour controlled building.
• The trucks would unload, pass through a wheel wash and exit the building. They would leave the site via Ipswich Street. This flow path spreads the truck traffic, and reduces onsite queuing.
• Waste processing would start immediately and would be fed into the advanced sorting lines. These sorting lines separate and remove commercially recyclable materials such as paper, cardboard, certain plastics and metals.
• Inert and non-combustible materials such as glass, soil, aggregates are also separated out and exported to other recyclers.
• Plastics #1 (HDPE), #2 (PET) and #3 (PVC), metals, clean paper and other recyclables are baled and placed in containers.
• These containers are taken to the adjacent railway siding and transported interstate, to environmentally viable reuse markets outside the ACT.
• After recycling, the remaining waste residue is either placed into specialised containers for rail transfer to the Woodlawn Bioreactor, or shredded to form a homogeneous minus 70mm fuel for the renewable waste to energy process if approved.

“WtE Plants reduce the space required for landfill by 90%”

wppenergycorp.com/faqs

South Shunt – Fyshwick

Train moving containers of waste/recyclables

THE INTERMODAL FREIGHT RAIL TERMINAL

The site is close to an existing railway corridor. This is an opportunity to rejuvenate ACT rail infrastructure and create a general freight service for the businesses of Canberra.
CRS proposes to use the railway to transport recycled materials and the waste residues. We would use an existing 2,800m long rail siding called the ‘south shunt’.
CRS has received a $1 million grant from the NSW State Government to renovate the track. A separate development application has been approved by the ACT Government to upgrade the rail, consolidate the blocks of land, and create a hardstand area next to rail line.
The disused railway is an optimal way to move recyclables to eastern seaboard ports. It can remove many large trucks that travel to and from Canberra and the region. It is global best practice to transport waste residues and export recycled products using rail containers. CRS will continue to seek environmentally sensible local, regional and international markets using the rail network.
An essential part of establishing a viable and regular railway freight service is to have reliable volumes of freight to move. The project will establish a commercial scale intermodal freight terminal to provide a regular, competitively priced, railway freight service access. This gives importers and exporters a way to move containerised goods into and out of Canberra, more efficiently and at lower costs. This has economic and environmental benefits.
Since the community engagement commenced in 2017, a number of Fyshwick businesses have approached us about this facility.
All of the potential rail transport activities can be readily scheduled with no disruption to the existing commuter train services – the CRS dedicated siding has enough capacity for several train sets.

“1 MWe will power over 1000 houses in the ACT”

CRS

WASTE TO ENERGY

Renewable energy can replace the need for fossil fuels in conventional power plants. As such, the proposal is consistent with ACT Government’s focus on renewable energy, carbon-neutrality and an innovative waste management future.
The CRS 15 Mega-watt energy facility utilises thermal combustion to generate electricity. This process transports the waste, called refuse derived fuel (RDF) over a series of grates. From the grates conditioned air is blown through and over the top of the fuel. This prompts a very efficient, high-temperature combustion. The organic part of the waste is oxidised into carbon dioxide and water. The ash and metals fall through the grate to be cooled in water. They are then recovered as a recycled resource.
The flue gas contains water, combustion gases, oxygen and nitrogen. During the combustion process, hot flue gases are released in the furnace and they flow over tubes of water inside the boiler – this produces steam. The steam, in turn, spins a turbine which drives an electric generator and produces electricity. The steam exits the turbine and is condensed back into water, and goes back to the boiler, and so on for reuse.
After heating the boiler, the gases then enter the flue gas cleaning system. They are cleaned in a number of stages:
1. Dust is caught and separated
2. Heavy metals are extracted
3. Sulphur is removed
4. Acid components of the flue gases are removed
5. Organic pollutants, such as dioxin are destroyed
The emissions are very closely monitored in the centre’s centralised control room. The emissions’ control equipment is sensitive to changes.
Several overseas plants have this information live on their website, so that people living close to the plant can see that the air emissions are compliant and as low as possible. Renewable energy plants like these have consistently met strict European emission standards, including in very densely populated neighbourhoods, for many years.
CRS proposes similar live monitors for complete transparency. For more information about the emission control technology please see Luehr Emissions Controls.
An ash residue is created during the combustion process, called a fly ash and the ash from the combusted material is called bottom ash.
Typically, the bottom ash contains valuable metals as well as inert materials such as ceramics and glass – which are all extracted. Where possible the bottom ash is reused in road base, leaving only the fly ash residue from the emission control process requiring disposal. Typically, this is as little as 4% (by weight) of the total fuel input into the renewable energy plant.

Issy les Moulineaux Paris, France – 460,000 Tpa

Premnitz, Germany 270,000 Tpa

Spittelau, Vienna Austria 250,000 Tpa

Hennepin, Minneapolis USA 370,000 Tpa