Republic of the Philippines

Commission on Higher Education

MSU – Iligan Institute of Technology
College of Engineering and Technology
Department of Mechanical Engineering and Technology

ASSESSMENT ON THE SOLID WASTES IN SURIGAO CITY

AS A POTENTIAL SOURCE OF ENERGY

MEC 152 – Introduction to Energy Engineering

Technical Report #1

Presented to The Faculty of

Mechanical Engineering and Technology Department
College of Engineering and Technology
Mindanao State University – Iligan Institute of Technology
Iligan City

Prepared by:

HANNAH MARIE PAAS TULANG

September 24, 2021

 SUMMARY

The waste problem has grown into a crisis over the past year. It poses a threat to public

health and the environment if it is not stored, collected, and disposed of properly. In Surigao

City, solid wastes disposal remains the top priority of the city government. The increasing

generation of such solid waste posed a great demand in the municipal budget. Hence, the

researcher would like to extend this report to assess the solid wastes in Surigao City as a

potential source of energy. With this, it can make use of waste-to-energy operations that can be

used to generate electricity. For this report, the researcher maximizes the most recent data from

the city government's Surigao City Ecological Profile from 2017. From the collected data, the

net weight of both paper and plastics in Surigao City generates an average of 17 kg/day. Based

on the data, it is observed that papers have a higher percentage with 61.34% than of cellophane

with 38.66% in a year. With the collected data, Dulong’s formula needs to be applied in order

to determine the possible energy generated in Surigao City’s solid wastes i.e., paper and plastics.

If WTE incineration is applied to the solid wastes considered i.e., paper and plastics, net electric

power generated a day is 0.74 kW. With that, the researcher concludes that even a small amount

of waste can still generate a significant amount of energy once utilized properly. Also, this does

not just generate energy but also helps the city minimize solid wastes that end up in landfills.
 INTRODUCTION

Economic and population growth increases energy consumption and waste and has

become the two major problems in the Philippines. Based on the Philippine Statistics Authority,

an average Filipino generates 0.5-5 kg of wastes daily (Moralde, 2016). In line with this, solid

waste management remains the most alarming environmental challenge yet in the country.

Wherein if inefficiently managed, brings implications affecting the environment and health.

In a circular economy, where waste is recycled into new products rather than being

thrown away, technologies give new life to waste plastics. Which then transforms the problem

of mounting waste plastic into new ones (Sunil Kumar, 2021). Existing researches have been

carried out converting waste plastics into liquid fuel by thermal and catalytic pyrolysis. It then

led to the establishment of several successful firms converting waste plastics into liquid fuel

(Sachin Kumar, 2011). Furthermore, cold plasma pyrolysis has been used by other researchers

to convert waste plastics into gases such as hydrogen, methane, and ethylene. Where hydrogen

and methane can be used as clean fuels since they only produce minimal amounts of harmful

compounds such as soot, unburnt hydrocarbons, and carbon dioxide (CO₂) (Ketchell, 2018).

Cold plasma is used because of its uniqueness. It mainly produces hot (highly energetic)

electrons where particles are great for breaking down the chemical bonds of plastics (Ketchell,

2018). Electricity for generating the cold plasma can be derived from renewables with the

chemical products derived from the process used as a form of energy storage: where the energy

is kept in a different form to be used later (Phan, 2018).

Plastics have become a part of human life. They are everywhere, in our food, storage,

appliances, house decor, etc. They are non-biodegradable polymers containing carbon,

hydrogen, and few other elements such as chlorine, nitrogen, etc. (Sachin Kumar, 2011). Due

to the increasing issues related to plastic wastes, popular terms have emerged such as Reuse,
Reduce, and Recycle. Another alternative way to handle plastic waste is currently being studied

and comprehensively developed that is converting plastic waste into fuel oil. Advancements in

technology make it possible for scientists and engineers to convert plastic waste into fuel

known as the pyrolysis process (Arif Setyo Nugroho, 2018).

From (Masud, 2014), plastic wastes can be used in different aspects such as

reprocessing will use the pallets for manufacturing, plastics wastes can be used for energy

generation, can be used for landfill, waste plastic oil as diesel fuel in the diesel engine, and it

can be used for making road.

A waste-to-energy also is when wastes are being used as fuels for generating power.

This is in a way like other power plants that use coal, oil, or natural gas for generating energy.

The fuel heats water into steam that drives a turbine to create electricity. With this kind of

process, a community’s landfill volume by up to 90 percent can reduce and prevent one ton of

carbon dioxide released for every ton of waste burned (DELTAWAY, 2021).

Other studies also make use of waste-to-energy in a refuse-derived fuel (RDF) that can

be used to generate electricity. Converting MSW into biogas can provide clean cooking fuel to

rural areas, thereby reducing our dependence on hydrocarbons. Thus, energy recovery from

MSW will diversify to energy basket (Thermax Ltd., IL&FS Environmental Infrastructure &

Services Ltd., Kirloskar Integrated Technologies Ltd., . Jindal Ecopolis, 2008).

Furthermore, a study shows a 100-pound of MSW (Municipal Solid Waste) in the

United States, about 85 pounds can be burned as fuel to generate electricity. Waste-to-energy

plants help reduce 2,000 pounds of garbage to ash weighing about 300 pounds to 600 pounds

as well as lessen the volume of waste by about 87% (U.S. Energy Information Administration,

2020).
 In Surigao City, solid wastes disposal remains the top priority of the city government.

The city ENRO sustained the daily garbage collection and disposal of solid wastes to the

sanitary landfill at Cagniog Sanitary Landfill. Through Materials Recovery Facilities (MRFs),

the city can sustain the operation of solid waste disposal. It attributes as a way to reduce the

volume of garbage that will be disposed to the dumpsite. However, the city has no substantial

intermediate treatment facilities presently existing as such the city is dependent on recycling

activities as the only means of waste volume reduction (Surigao City Government, 2017).

Surigao City is an urbanizing city and is known for having constant power outages. In

line with that, it motivates the researcher to find a way to mitigate solid wastes in Surigao City

as well as find an alternative source of energy. Past studies have researched alternative energy

derived from renewable resources. Some also focused on the development of sources from

vegetable and mine materials (Sachin Kumar, 2011). Hence for this report, the researcher aims

to assess solid wastes in Surigao City that potentially generate energy. In that way, it is now

possible to realize the true value of plastic waste – and turn it into something clean and useful.
 EVALUATION DETAILS

This part focuses on how the researcher gathered the data to satisfy the objective of this

report which is to assess the potential of solid wastes in Surigao City as an alternative source

of energy. In data gathering, the researcher maximizes the most recent data from the city

government's Surigao City Ecological Profile. The data given shows the Waste

Management part that includes waste generation, waste storage, waste collection and transport,

waste treatment and processing, waste disposal, and education information [5]. However, the

focus of this report is to mitigate the solid wastes in the city and therefore will only focus on

the wastes collected i.e., paper and plastic cellophane as shown in Table 1.

SOURCE Cellophane and Paper

Collected (in kilogram)
Cellophane Paper Total
1. Departments 135.9 1484.5 1,620.4
2. Barangays 1880.7 528.0 2,408.7
3. Individuals 165.9 66.5 232.4
4. Establishments 54.0 1456.0 1,510.0
5. Schools 109.0 186.0 295.0
TOTAL 2,345.5 3,721.0 6,066.5
TOTAL (%) 38.66 61.34 100
Table 1. Surigao City’s collected solid wastes: cellophane and paper (2017).

From the collected data net weight of paper and plastics from Surigao City, it can have

an average of 17 kg/day. Based on the data, it is observed that papers have higher percentage

with 61.34% than of cellophane with 38.66%.

 Total Weight (kg)
2000 1880.7
1800
1600 1484.5 1456
1400
1200
1000
800
600 528
400
135.9 165.9 186
200 66.5 54 109
0
Department Barangays Individuals Establishments Schools
Plastic Paper

Figure 1. Weight of solid wastes i.e., paper & plastics in Surigao City.

Also, the researcher included the data of the comparative electric power consumption

from 2014 to 2016. Surigao City had a total power consumption of 142,239,295 kWh as of

2016 per electrical connections with an increase of 4.87%. Tables 2 shows the comparative

electric power consumption.

Type of 2014 2015 2016

Connection (kWh) (kWh) (kWh)
Residential 60, 457, 897 67, 047, 258 76, 240, 905
Small Commercial 16,057,043 16,272,844 17,216,935
Low Voltage Public Building 5,649,902 6,008,961 6,544,105
Street Light 1,136,247 1,248,216 1,545,261
Small Commercial 320,289 331,606 342,488
Large Commercial 24,235,035 32,464,171 25,068,331
High Voltage Industrial 14,194,830 7,522,940 9,657,174
Public Building 3,894,745 4,641,814 5,488,981
Street Lights 88,000 100,687 135,115
TOTAL 126,033,988 135,638,497 142,239,295
Table 2. Surigao City Comparative Electric Power Consumption (2014-2016).
 Now using typical moisture content data, dry mass of each type of waste is calculated.

Once dry mass is calculated than amount of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur and ash

content is calculated for each type of waste using standard table of ultimate analysis of

combustible waste and Eq. 3.

Element content = Standard ultimate analysis mass percent kg (1)

Now revised mass is calculated for solid waste, as moisture in solid waste converts into

hydrogen and oxygen due to heat in incinerators. The final revised mass of element content of

whole Surigao City’s solid waste i.e., plastics and paper can be seen in Table 3.

Element Revised Mass (kg) Percent by mass

Carbon 2900.671 50.04
Hydrogen 375.3629 6.48
Oxygen 2063.084 35.59
Nitrogen 10.49322 0.18
Sulfur 6.99548 0.12
Ash 439.7234 7.59
Total 5796.33
Table 3. Revised mass (dry mass) of element content.

In calculating the revised mass and element content the researcher used the typical data

of moisture content of municipal solid waste and the typical percent values of elements in

different municipal waste (Vijai Krishna, 2019).

Now, to calculate the possible energy generated in Surigao City’s solid wastes i.e.,

plastics and paper collected in the year 2017, Dulong’s formula needs to be applied (Kumar,

2017). Dulong’s formula is described in Eq. (1)

Heat Energy (kJ/kg) = (4)

where C = carbon percent

H = hydrogen percent

O = oxygen percent
 S = sulfur percent

Putting percent by mass value from Table 3 into Dulong’s formula, net heat generated

by Surigao City’s total waste is obtained:

35.59
Heat Generated (kJ/kg) = [337(50.04) + 1428(6.48 - ) + 9(0.12)] kJ/kg
8

Heat Generated = 19765.185 kJ/kg (5)

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

Various steps are considered to calculate electricity generated using the solid wastes in

Surigao City. First, heat energy generated is used to calculate steam energy which is 70% of

heat energy. Finally, after steam energy calculation, net electric power generated by solid waste

is calculated after accounting station service allowance and heat losses.

Steam energy available 70% of heat energy

Steam energy available (0.70 × 19,765.185 kJ/kg) from Eq. 5

Steam energy available 13,835.63 kJ/kg

The value calculated for steam energy is used to run the turbines. These turbines are

coupled with generators which produces electricity. Heat rate is the heat input required to

produce one unit of electricity (kWh).

1 kW = 3,600 kJ/h (6)

From the above equation it is interpreted that if the energy conversion is 100 % efficient

then to produce one unit of electricity 3600 kJ energy is required. But practically no energy

conversion is 100% efficient, considering the conversion efficiency of 31.6% in a power plant
heat input of 3600 ÷ 31.6% = 11395 kJ/kWh is required. So, to produce 1kWh electrical energy 11395

kJ of steam energy is required. Therefore,

Electric Power Generation = Steam energy ÷ 11395 kJ/kWh

Electric Power Generation = 13, 835.63 kJ/kg ÷ 11395 kJ/kWh

Electric Power Generation = 1.214 kWh/kg

It was mentioned in the that the average solid waste (paper and plastics) in Surigao City

is 17 kg basing from the 2017’s total waste collected. With this, total electric power generation

can be calculated as:

Total electric power generated = 1.214 kWh/kg × 17 kg/day)

Total electric power generated = 20 kWh/day

As shown in the table, the collected solid wastes of paper and plastics can generate 20

kWh/day. This will surely increase if other types of solid wastes will be considered as well.

Now, calculating station service allowance and unaccounted heat loss during the operation, net

electric power generation can be obtained:

Station service allowance = 6% of total electric power generation

Station service allowance = (0.06 × 20 kWh/day)

Station service allowance = 1.2 kWh/day

Unaccounted heat loss = 5% of total electric power generation

Unaccounted heat loss = (0.05 × 20 kWh/day)

Unaccounted heat loss = 1 kWh/day

Hence, the net electric power generation can be obtained

 Net electric power generation = Electric power generation – (Station service
allowance + unaccounted heat loss)
Net electric power generation = 20 kWh/day – (1.2 + 1) kWh/day
Net electric power generated = 17.8 kWh/day

The value obtained above, generated electricity, is for one day and one day has 24 hours,

so using this net electric power is calculated for per hour basis. Hence, if WTE incineration

(Kumar, 2017) is applied on the solid wastes considered i.e., paper and plastics, net electric

power generated a day is 0.74 kW.

 CONCLUSION

Improved segregation and collection practices will also help cost-effectively recover

energy because this is a critical parameter for the successful operation of all the existing waste-

to-energy conversion technologies, which are otherwise well-proven, economically viable, and

have been performing well in other countries. With the obtained results, the researcher

concludes that even a small amount of waste could generate a certain amount of energy once

utilized properly. Also, this does not just generate energy but also helps the city minimize solid

wastes that end up in landfills. However, there are things to be considered during this kind of

operation. For a developing city like Surigao, this might be an expensive operation. The

challenge of MSW disposal and the demand for alternative energy resources are common in

many developing countries. Municipal Solid Waste Management (MSWM) can also be

considered as a Waste Management Plan rather than as an Electricity Generation Project as the

technology can lead to a substantial reduction in the overall waste quantities

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