Germans and Italians interested in scrap yards in Belgrade, Novi Sad and Niš - methane from 3 dumps is sufficient for production of electricity and heating energy

Scrap yards in Belgrade, Novi Sad and Niš have sufficient quantities of methane that could be used for production of electric and heating energy, and for heating of apartments. People in the Ministry of Environment say that they expect that the Germans, who expressed the greatest interest in the dumps in Niš and Novi Sad, will soon officially submit the preliminary project for use of gas from scrap yards.

- Germans visited these two dumps and estimated that the investment in them through the mechanism of pure development was financially profitable - Danijela Božanić, the Manager of the Group for Climatic Changes within the Ministry of Environment and Spatial Planning, says for "Novosti". – They have informed us and the representatives of Novi Sad’s and Niš’s local self-governments on their intentions. The only question now is what technology of production of thermal and electric energy they would choose, if it is going to be something brand new or some well-known technology that they use in their own country.

Heating from the dumps proved to be very useful in Europe: environment pollution is reduced and, at the same time, electric energy from coal is being saved.

Danijela Božanić says that, although Serbia has large number of scrap yards, the majority of them can not be used for the purpose of heating because of the long life or small quantity of waste on them.

- Scrap yards in Subotica, Vrbas, Kruševac and Kragujevac are relatively large, but they do not meet the necessary conditions, so that they can be used only within the scope of some united project – Božanić explains.

Miroslav Spasojević, the Chief of the Department for Sustainable Development within the Ministry of Energy and Mining, says that, in addition to the existing idea of use of methane for the needs of steam power plants, there is another, much realistic option. The recycled waste could be used as the energy potential for construction of steam power capacities.

- "Vinča" is, definitely, in focus, because it is the largest dump not only in Serbia, but also in the region - says Spasojević. – Its capacity ranges between 1,000 and 1,500 tons of waste per day. With relatively big investments, we could obtain large quantities of methane, which has 29 times larger capacity of carbon-dioxide.

Great interest

Italian companies have submitted about 10 preliminary projects related to pure technologies. They expressed the greatest interest in mini-hydroelectric power plants, as well as in use of biogas - says Danijela Božanić.