Ethiopia Plans to Convert Garbage into Energy
Ethiopia is planning to convert its garbage into energy through use of new technology. Koshe is the biggest garbage dump in Ethiopia and is located on the outskirts of the country's capital city, Addis Ababa. The Koshe garbage dump was in the news last year when 114 people died due to the pollutants emanating from the garbage dump – spread over an area approximately the size of 36 football fields.
Ethiopia has since turned the site into a new waste-to-energy plant via the Reppie Waste-to-Energy Project which is the first of its kind in Africa. This forms part of efforts to revolutionise waste management practices in the country. The plant is designed to generate electric power from solid waste collected from the capital.
Incinerating 1,400 tonnes of waste every day, the plant is capable of contributing 185GWh of electricity each year to the national grid.
However, Reppie Waste-to-Energy Project fell flat due to disputes between Ethiopian Electric Power (EEP) and two contractors – Cambridge Industries and its partner, China National Electric Engineering Company – which finally led to the plant ceasing operations soon after its inauguration.
Now, after hectic efforts to resolve the dispute, the Ethiopian Electric Power (EEP) is planning to restart operations of Reppie Waste-to-Energy power plant in three months and once again start generating electric power using the garbage at the Koshe rubbish dump.
Waste-to-energy uses trash as a fuel for power generation. Similar to other power plants (just using trash rather than other fuels like coal, oil, or natural gas), the fuel is burned in an environmentally sustainable manner, in a combustion chamber to heat tubes of water in boiler walls. The water is heated until it turns into steam, which is then used to drive a turbine generator that produces electricity.
"The hulking waste-to-energy power plant taking shape on the edge of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia’s capital, symbolises ambitions to convert the agrarian Horn of Africa country into an eco-friendly industrial powerhouse." wrote the Guardian newspaper.
In about a year, green, cutting-edge Reppie will replace a vast rubbish dump picked over by hundreds of scavengers. Currently, toxic effluent from the landfill seeps into nearby rivers when it rains and methane perpetually drifts into the atmosphere.
Constructing Africa's first major waste-to-energy facility fits perfectly with Ethiopia’s Climate Resilient Green Economy. The plant will eliminate over 80% of the Municipal Waste delivered to it, whilst at the same time maximizing energy recovery in order to deliver much-needed renewable power to the surrounding cities and towns.
