Excursion to Veluwe Waste Recycling
Report: Company visit to VAR on 24 March 2010
VAR stands for Veluwse Afval Recycling, a waste management company based in Wilp, along the A1 motorway. A tall landfill hump obscures passers-by on the motorway from seeing the 75-hectare site. Together with the site in Spijk, it processes 1.3 million tonnes of waste annually, reusing 88% and this percentage is still rising every year! Good for an annual turnover of €45 million.
We are guests of Ruurd van Schaik, Engineering Division Manager. This is a separate division of the company, focused on selling to third parties everything developed in-house for waste separation and reprocessing. This innovation is necessary because every year the requirements become stricter, raising the bar again.
Ruurd starts by explaining the 'Ladder of Lansink', which is still relevant to them. In order of desirability: prevention, product re-use, material re-use, recovery (e.g. compost), use as a secondary fuel, incineration (energy extraction), or if there is no other way, landfill. Overcapacity of WWTPs (waste incineration plants) depresses the price of incineration and landfill, which reduces incentives for recycling. This should be changed!
Most successful activity in Wilp is rubble recycling: this achieves 96% reuse! This is a world success and is linked to the need in the Netherlands for building materials and the fact that we cannot easily and cheaply extract them from mountains. Extracting it from the ground immediately creates a lake, which is not always desirable either.
One project that is currently working hard on is recycling artificial grass. The first generation of hockey pitches is currently being remediated and this generates a huge amount of waste. The problem is separating the vinyl backing from the 'grass'. Ruurd says they expect a breakthrough on this soon, working in limited cooperation with Ten Cate.
A recent project is the GFT digester. In it, accelerated fermentation is achieved at elevated temperature, so that GFT is composted within 2 months. 3% of VGF waste is landfilled afterwards, as it contains an accumulation of plastic. The bio-gas obtained in the process is good for 2 MW of electricity. The heat released is only partially used to heat the digester; a lot of heat is left over for e.g. horticultural greenhouses. VAR itself has been energy-neutral since 2009.
What they do not do is process electronics, white and brown goods. This is separated and taken away to Apeldoorn, where there is a specialist in this field. (Idea for next excursion!)
Dick Kroon
25-3-2010
Description
The waste recycling company VAR processes large amounts of waste every year. At the recycling centre 'De Sluiner' in Wilp, there is therefore much to see, such as:
* Composting VGF waste
* Anaerobic digesters
* Sorting industrial waste into usable streams
* Processing waste into secondary fuel
* Recycling construction and demolition waste
* Excavating and remediating old landfill sites
* Sand recycling and landfilling residues
The programme of the meeting is as follows:
15.45
Reception with coffee and tea
16.00
Presentation "What is and what does the VAR do" by Ruurd van Schaik
16.45
Tour of site by bus (approx. 75 ha)
Location
Sluinerweg 12, 7384 SC Wilp-Achterhoek
Organiser
Eastern Region
Name and contact details for information
Further information from Elfride Dijkstra-ten Dam, tel: 053-4894097 or via the e-mail address below.