Kazuyuki Oshita

Behavior of cesium in municipal solid waste incineration.

As a result of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident on March 11, 2011 in Japan radioactive nuclides, primarily (134)Cs and (137)Cs were released, contaminating municipal solid waste and sewage sludge in the area. Although stabilizing the waste and reducing its volume is an important issue differing from Chernobyl nuclear power plant accident, secondary emission of radioactive nuclides as a result of any intermediate remediation process is of concern. Unfortunately, there is little research on the behavior of radioactive nuclides during waste treatment. This study focuses on waste incineration in an effort to clarify the behavior of radioactive nuclides, specifically, refuse-derived fuel (RDF) with added (133)Cs (stable nuclide) or (134)Cs (radioactive nuclide) was incinerated in laboratory- and pilot-scale experiments. Next, thermogravimetric (TG) and differential thermal analysis (DTA) of stable Cs compounds, as well as an X-ray absorption fine structure (XAFS) analysis of Cs concentrated in the ashes were performed to validate the behavior and chemical forms of Cs during the combustion. Our results showed that at higher temperatures and at larger equivalence ratios, (133)Cs was distributed to the bottom ash at lower concentration, and the influence of the equivalence ratio was more significant at lower temperatures. (134)Cs behaved in a similar fashion as (133)Cs. We found through TG-DTA and XAFS analysis that a portion of Cs in RDF vaporizes and is transferred to fly ash where it exists as CsCl in the MSW incinerator. We conclude that Cs-contaminated municipal solid wastes could be incinerated at high temperatures resulting in a small amount of fly ash with a high concentration of radioactive Cs, and a bottom ash with low concentrations.

Methane and nitrous oxide emissions following anaerobic digestion of sludge in Japanese sewage treatment facilities.

Methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) are potent greenhouse gases with global warming potentials (expressed in terms of CO2-equivalents) of 28 and 265, respectively. When emitted to the atmosphere, they significantly contribute to climate change. It was previously suggested that in wastewater treatment facilities that apply anaerobic sludge digestion, CH4 continues to be emitted from digested sludge after leaving the anaerobic digester. This paper studies the CH4 and N2O emissions from anaerobically digested sludge in the subsequent sludge treatment steps. Two full-scale treatment plants were monitored over a 1-year period. Average emissions of CH4 and N2O were 509±72 mg/m(3)-influent (wastewater) and 7.1±2.6 mg/m(3)-influent, respectively. These values accounted for 22.4±3.8% of the indirect reduction in CO2-emissions when electricity was generated using biogas. They are considered to be significant.

Characterization of lead, chromium, and cadmium in dust emitted from municipal solid waste incineration plants

The dust is emitted from municipal solid waste incinerators (MSWIs). Volatile toxic heavy metals are abundant in smaller dust particles and influence the toxicity of particulate matter such as fine particles <2.5 ?m (PM2.5). However, little is known about the properties of these metals in fine dust particles. Therefore, X-ray absorption fine structure (XAFS) spectroscopy was used to investigate the chemical states of lead (Pb), chromium (Cr), and cadmium (Cd) in MSWI dust collected for nine particle size fractions at the inlet of the dust collector and the stacks of two MSWI plants. XAFS spectroscopy of the dust in the inlet of the dust collectors showed that finer dust contained predominantly Pb as PbCl2 with some PbSiO3, coarser dust consisted of Cr forms, including more toxic Cr(VI) species, and all dust contained CdCl2. Although the dust collector removed almost all of the Pb, trace amounts of PbCl2 remained in the stack gas after passing through the dust collector.