Developing EU environmental standards for the food, drink and milk industries: key environmental issues and data collection

Background The European Commission organised the review of the best available techniques reference document for the food, drink and milk industries according to the provisions of the Industrial Emissions Directive (Directive 2010/75/EU). Under this policy, an exchange of information between Member States, industrial organisations, non-governmental organisations promoting the protection of the environment and the European Commission took place. Results A crucial part for developing these EU environmental standards was the determination of the key environmental issues of the food, drink and milk sector. Key environmental issues were defined for emissions to air and water, and for energy and water consumption. The key environmental issues were determined by using four criteria proposed by the European Commission. Moreover, a data collection procedure was designed and real-plant emissions and consumption data were obtained from a variety of food, drink and milk installations across the European Union. Conclusions The development of the EU environmental standards for the food, drink and milk sector will be the reference for the operation of around 2 800 installations in Europe until these standards are reviewed again.

Syngas Quality as a Key Factor in the Design of an Energy-Efficient Pyrolysis Plant for Scrap Tyres

In 2016 4.94 million tonnes of tyres were produced. Each tyre eventually become waste and pyrolysis has been considered an effective way of utilizing scrap tyres for several decades. However, pyrolysis has failed many times because the process has a great energy demand and the quality of products is unstable or insufficient for commercial use. Usually plants are focused on the production of pyrolytic oil or char and the gaseous phase is only a by-product. In this paper the importance of composition and quality of pyrolytic gas is emphasized. The main chemical properties make this gas a valuable biofuel that may satisfy energy requirements of the whole process (except for the start-up phase). Available data from literature concerning composition and other features of the pyrolytic gas from scrap tyres obtained at temperatures up to 1000 °C are compared with experimental results. The quality of evolved gases is discussed in the context of the Industrial Emissions Directive (IED), too. Finally, an analysis of the mass balances obtained allows a decision about the business profile and profitability.