Power from waste is transformed to hydrogen for clean mobility

120 years after the Wuppertal’s Schwebebahn opened, the city is putting itself on the map again for its innovative approach on this occasion combining waste handling with zero-emissions mobility.

Green hydrogen produced from the incineration of municipal waste will be used as an energy vector to power a fleet of fuel cell electric buses (FVEBs). “This sector coupling concept, using hydrogen to link rubbish disposal to emissions-free public transport is one of many projects underway in the Hydrogen Competence Region taking place in Wuppertal, Düsseldorf and other towns in Nordrhein Westfahlen”, says Willy Görtz who leads the projects department at AWG Abfallwirtschaftsgesellschaft mbH in Wuppertal (the city’s waste collection and disposal organisation).

The electrical power for the electrolysis which produces the hydrogen will be generated from the combustion of municipal solid waste. The Wuppertal waste incinerator burns over 1000 tonnes per day of municipal solid waste collected from local businesses and approximately 1.5 million people in the region. A fraction of the power generated by the incinerator will be used to charge the electrolyser. Households in Wuppertal use four bins for their waste: one for paper and cardboard, another for green waste from the garden or food scraps from the kitchen a third for packaging such as plastic bags and a fourth bin for ‘everything else’ or ‘Restmüll’. The paper, packaging and green waste all go their separate ways for appropriate processing. Only the Restmüll – the most difficult rubbish to dispose of in other ways – is used as feedstock to the waste-incinerator.

Despite the removal of the green and paper material by the households, the Restmüll from residents still has a biomass content of more than 50%. Using this feedstock and carbon dioxide emissions trading, the electricity generated on the Wuppertal waste incinerator can therefore be classified as ‘Green’. This enables the hydrogen produced on the electrolyser to carry the same environmentally friendly credentials.

Source: Recycling Magazine