Laserfiche WebLink
- 27 - <br /> <br />Full-scale baling technology is not currently economically <br />feasible at small disposal sites. For a 300 TPD facility, current <br />costs are on the order of $5.00 per ton ($560 per metric ton). <br /> <br />4. RESOURCE RECOVERY <br /> <br />The following discussion of resource recovery program costs is <br />based on the economic analysis in the MPCA Resource Recovery Plan <br />(1979). The plan divided the recovery systems into the <br />following ranges of size: less than 100 tons per day (TPD), <br />between 100 TPD and 500 TPD, and over 500 TPD. The resource <br />recovery systems analyzed included modular combustion units, <br />waterwall incineration, refuse-derived fuel (RDF), dedicated <br />boilers (a type of RDF system), and rotating compost drum (Dano <br />Process). The consultant preparing the plan for MPCA, Barr <br />Engineering, used historical data whenever possible and published <br />estimates where actual data were not available. <br /> <br />Table 4 displays the results of the MPCA analysis. Ail capital <br />cost estimates are in 1978 dollars. Amortized capital costs are <br />based on a seven?percent interest rate and 20-year amortization <br />period. Capital costs in most cases include all contingency, <br />engineering, legal and administrative costs, as well as bond <br />acquisition, site preparation and construction costs. <br /> <br />Generally, capital costs for high-technology systems are fairly <br />well docmented; operating costs estimates are less reliable. <br />Construction costs have been documented for several facilities, <br />but shakedown-related problems and long construction time lags <br />have hampered the development of representative operating costs <br />information. Furthermore, in many cases, existing operations <br />data does not represent the cost of a system operating at its <br />optimum level. There seems to be an emerging record of systems <br />being over-designed. Anticipated solid waste streams in some <br />cases have not materialized; therefore, operating costs are often <br />higher than expected. <br /> <br />Most operations are also designed with some measure of redundancy <br />(less than 100 percent in most cases) built into the processing <br />streams. For most of the systems studied in the 1979 MPCA Plan, <br />the actual unit cost range is broad. This appears to be a result <br />of two factors: 1) the small number of facilities in actual <br />operation, and 2) the site-specific nature of most solid waste <br />disposal costs and revenues. The existing data base for high- <br />technology resource recovery is generally not yet broad enough to <br />reliably determine solid waste disposal costs. It is important <br />to note that the values represented in Table 4 are the weighted <br />averages of a range of data points. <br /> <br />The data showing the greatest degree of variation is that for <br />revenues from the sale of recovered materials or energy. The <br />range of values was determined from referenced sources, but the <br />average revenues were adjusted based on experience with existing <br />markets. All materials recovery systems were assumed to employ <br />front-end recovery, using state-of-the-art processes. Average <br /> <br /> <br />