New EuRec shredder for waste recycling Horgen (Switzerland) successfully commissioned.

The Horgen waste recycling plant, which was commissioned in 1967, was designed for 60,000 tonnes of waste per year. At that time, the system was implemented in 2 lines. From 2015, one line was taken out of operation due to reduced waste volumes. Today, the incineration plant incinerates 35,000 t/a of domestic waste, mixed construction waste and commercial waste. The Horgen plant is thus one of the smallest refuse incineration plants in Switzerland.

Since the mid-1990s, the waste delivered has already been pre-shredded. The pre-small size reduction increases the operational stability, since very large individual pieces are delivered with the raw waste. Sofas, railway sleepers and other large pieces of waste without pre-shredding would repeatedly lead to breakdowns, downtimes and, in the worst-case scenario, a complete shutdown of the plant. At the beginning of operation of the operation a rotor shear system of a combustion plant was installed by a competitor. Due to the frequent malfunctions and high maintenance costs, this system was then replaced in 2002 by a slow-running EuRec two-shaft shredder. The EuRec machine has now been successfully in operation for 15 years and has now been supplemented by a new machine. At the Horgen plant, the slags are processed dry. The dry slag treatment process results in improved recycling rates for metal extraction. Due to the conveyor belt widths and different hopper openings in the plant, the existing slag processing system would not be able to operate without pre-crushing.

Romano Wild, Managing Director of Waste Utilisation Horgen says:"The EuRec machine has worked very reliably from the outset and convinced us with its low maintenance costs. The machine has been in use for 15 years now and is still working perfectly. Of course, we have to expect that this machine will soon fail. In order to avoid a major plant standstill of the incineration plant, we decided to install another EuRec machine in 2016. The old machine will continue to be ready for operation, thus providing us with redundancy in the future. The new machine shreds the waste so finely that the continuity in the steam volume set point (power) has been been in use for 15 years now and is still working perfectly. Of course, we have to expect that this machine will soon fail. In order to avoid a major plant standstill of the incineration plant, we decided to install another EuRec machine in 2016. The old machine will continue to be ready for operation, thus providing us with redundancy in the future. The new machine shreds the waste so finely that the continuity in the steam volume set point (power) has been significantly improved. Overall, the operation of the incineration plant with a pre-shredded waste is significantly more trouble-free and the organic components in the slag combustion process are also reduced. This helps us to significantly undercut the strict Swiss landfill limits. In this respect, pre-crushing is an indispensable process step in our plant."