Abstract
The “European Union Training Network for Resource Recovery Through Enhanced Landfill Mining (NEW-MINE)” was a European research project conducted between 2016 and 2020 to investigate the exploration of and resource recovery from landfills as well as the processing of the excavated waste and the valorization of the obtained waste fractions using thermochemical processes. This project yielded more than 40 publications ranging from geophysics via mechanical process engineering to ceramics, which have not yet been discussed coherently in a review publication. This article summarizes and links the NEW-MINE publications and discusses their practical applicability in waste management systems. Within the NEW-MINE project in a first step concentrates of specific materials (e.g., metals, combustibles, inert materials) were produced which might be used as secondary raw materials. In a second step, recycled products (e.g., inorganic polymers, functional glass-ceramics) were produced from these concentrates at the lab scale. However, even if secondary raw materials or recycled products could be produced at a large scale, it remains unclear if they can compete with primary raw materials or products from primary raw materials. Given the ambitions of transition towards a more circular economy, economic incentives are required to make secondary raw materials or recycled products from enhanced landfill mining (ELFM) competitive in the market.
Highlights
Landfill mining, “the process for extracting minerals or other solid natural resources from waste materials that have previously been disposed of by burying them in the ground” [1], has been investigated since 1953 [2], the interest in this topic only really started in the 1980s in the USA [3] and the 1990s in Europe [4]
Landfills have been investigated long before the NEW-MINE project with respect to environmental problems arising from the landfilled waste [23,24,25]
Within the NEW-MINE project the entire process chain, from landfill exploration via excavation and mechanical processing to thermochemical conversion and beneficiation of conversion products, has been investigated. This broad scope constituted a unique feature of the NEW-MINE project and, correspondingly, many publications do not address the landfill mining itself, but waste treatment technologies, which may be used for waste from other sources than landfills
Summary
“the process for extracting minerals or other solid natural resources from waste materials that have previously been disposed of by burying them in the ground” [1], has been investigated since 1953 [2], the interest in this topic only really started in the 1980s in the USA [3] and the 1990s in Europe [4]. Between 2017 and 2015, several national (research) projects such as the “Closing the Circle” project (Flanders/Belgium) [6], the LAMIS project (Austria) [7,8,9,10], the MINERVE project (Wallonia/Belgium) [11] and the TönsLM project (Germany) [12] were conducted, which focused more on material and energy recovery These projects covered different process steps ranging from geophysical exploration via exploration to dry and wet mechanical processing. In detail, recycling of inorganic-nonmetallic materials even from fresh construction and demolition waste is mainly as aggregate [16], Processes 2021, 9, 394 to be removed from the circular economy [15]. FFoorr aa ppeerriioodd ooff ffoouurr yyeeaarrss,, 1155 eeaarrllyy ssttaaggee rreesseeaarrcchheerrss ((EESSRRss)) iinnvveessttiiggaatteedd tthhee eexxpplloo-rraattiioonn ooff aanndd rreessoouurrccee rreeccoovveerryy ffrroommllaannddfifillllssaasswweellllaasstthheepprroocceessssiinnggoofftthheeeexxccaavvaatteedd wwaasstteeaannddththe evavlaolroizraiztaiotinoonf othf ethoebtoabinteadinwedaswteafsrtaectfiroancstiuonsisngusthinegrmthoecrhmemocichaelmpircoaclespsreos(cFeisgsuerse(F1)i.gure 1)
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