Waste Press for the Mechanical Treatment of Organic Waste

If contraries are not removed before or after the biological treatment, they end up in the compost or digestate. In case of fermentation contraries like glass or stone can reduce the volume of the digester and can cause increased wearing of various parts ofthe fermentation plant, e.g. pumps, pipes, etc. In this work organic waste was mechanically treated with a waste press (VMPress). The pressse parates the waste into a wet fraction for biological treatment and a dry contraries fraction forincineration or further treatment. The press consists of a cylinder tube which is perforated at oneend with bores of 10 mm diameter and a hopper for feeding the press. A hydraulic post pushes the waste with high pressure (20-30 MN/m2) into the cylinder to the perforated end where the liquid and soft parts of the waste are pressed out. After the pressing step the cylinder bottom at the perforated end is opened and the remaining material is pushed out of the cylinder. Subsequently new material is filled into the hopper and the pressing process starts again. The aim of this work was to assess the contraries separation efficiency of the waste press.