Assessment of environmental, energy and economic prospective of anaerobic digestion of organic municipal solid waste in Malaysia

The continuous increase in population, higher living standards and economic development resulted in the inevitable increase of waste generation, energy consumption, carbon emissions and environmental degradation. The current average operating expenditure (OPEX) of a landfill is RM148/tonne/day for disposing municipal solid waste (MSW) which is an economic burden to the government. Thus, this study investigates the feasibility of biogas production from organic MSW as a renewable source of energy via anaerobic digestion. The economic and environmental benefits including the sales of electricity and fertilizer were investigated. Organic fraction municipal solid waste (OFMSW) was collected at Sahom landfill, Kampar. Waste composition was analyzed to determine the percentage of organic waste. Approximate and ultimate analysis were conducted to characterize the organic samples and to measure the calorific value. The biogas and bio-fertilizer yield were estimated. It was found that OFMSW consists 45% of the total MSW. Conversion of OFMSW to electricity and fertilizer via anaerobic digestion (AD) resulted in 3,274,812.51 m3/day of biogas which consists of 56.62% CH4 and 43.38% carbon dioxide. This can be resulted in 7,494.08 MWh/day of electrical energy and a daily yield of 13,013.73 tonnes of bio-fertilizer. This transforms the economic burden of solid waste management expenditures into an income generating movement.