Dubai’s $1.09bn (AED 4 billion) Warsan waste-to-energy plant has entered full commercial operations after four years under construction.
Billed as one of the biggest such plants in the world, it burns 5,666 tonnes of municipal solid waste per working day, delivered in more than 80 truckloads an hour.
It will generate up to 220MW of energy a year, around 2% of the electricity Dubai consumes annually.
The yearly tally of waste burned is set to be 1.9 million tonnes, or 45% of the waste Dubai currently produces.
It recycles recovered metals as well as leftover ash for cement production, said Belgium’s Besix, the main contractor and one of the industrial equity providers in the public-private partnership.
It was developed for Dubai Municipality by a consortium called Warsan Waste Management Company, comprising Besix, Hitachi Zosen Inova, Dubai Holding, Dubal Holding, and Itochu. The company will operate and maintain the plant for 35 years.
Financing came from international lending institutions including the Japan Bank for International Cooperation and the Nippon Export Investment and Insurance Agency.
Circular features
Ramboll acted as owner’s engineer. It noted the plant’s circular features.
Of the electricity generated, 35MW are used to power the nearby Warsan Wastewater Treatment Plant, which supplies the waste-to-energy plant with the 1,200 cu m of water it uses every day.
A further 20MW are used to operate the waste-to-energy plant itself. The rest is fed into the local grid.
The plant has five high-pressure steam drum boilers producing steam at 430 deg C.
The Warsan Waste Management Company says the plant’s flue gas treatment plant keeps pollution low “in compliance with the most stringent current European emissions standards”.
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