Energy from municipal solid waste: some considerations on emissions and health impact

This paper presents an overview of some criticalities of pollutants resulted from the solutions adopted for obtaining energy from residual municipal solid waste (RMSW) and from organic fraction of municipal solid waste (OFMSW). The first part of this paper deals with the evolution of the interest towards health impact and pollution resulted from the treatment for these two waste streams: RMSW and OFMSW. The second part concerns the relevance of the pollutants in terms of health impact in the strategies adopted to manage those streams of waste, taking into account the evolution of the sector, including the biomethane option for OFMSW and the Solid Recovered Fuel (SRF) option for RMSW. The PCDD/F issue seems to be under control. Heavy metals and NOx remain pollutants to manage carefully in design and operation of plants.