Sako
INNOVATION!
RENEWABLE ENERGY!
SUSTAINABILITY!

The European union legislative proposal on waste sets clear targets for reducing waste and establishes an ambitious and credible long-term path for waste management and recycling. One of the key elements is to reduce landfills to a maximum of 10% of municipal waste by 2030. Thus, SAKO Brno has been preparing to increase its capacity to fulfill waste management plans of the South Moravian Region and the Czech Republic. Moreover, the currently operated lines are in the middle of service life, which slowly starts to show up on their reliability and frequency of unscheduled shut-downs. Finally, it is necessary to solve the planned transfer of heat distribution to the district heating system from steam to hot water.

Construction of the third K1 line will increase efficiency and the total amount of power generated, while increasing reliability of contractual power supplies and diversion of residual municipal wastes from landfills to a higher level in the waste treatment hierarchy, which is energy recovery. Simultaneously, we will reach a significant reduction of CO₂ fossil emissions.

Nowadays, 85 % of residual municipal waste ends up in landfills; the remaining 15 % is energy-utilized in four waste-to-energy plants. The trend is the opposite in western Europe; no waste is disposed of at landfills anymore; thanks to the higher number of plants, it is utilized for heat and electric power production.

The construction will be stepwise, divided into several units; citizens will be negligible affected by the construction. All the processes will be under the strict control of related authorities. From a distance, only high cranes will be visible during construction.

Construction of this part of the plant can be compared to a standard industrial building. Thanks to the construction, the entire premises will be revitalized and the areas will become more modern, with emphasis on environmental approaches, such as green roofs and photovoltaic panels.

The start of the construction is planned for autumn 2023; project shall be finished within the autumn 2026.

The plant will primarily be used for the South Moravian Region, which produces more than 350 thousand tons of energy recoverable waste. The remaining free capacity will be offered to the adjacent regions. Two of them are already delivering their waste to our facility. Both road and railway transport is anticipated. Concerning 2030, we expect diversion from landfilling, with subsequent increasing preference for energy recovery from municipal wastes.

Vehicle traffic load intensity will not increase rapidly; on the contrary; it will gradually decline. By 2035, we anticipate a reduction in vehicle traffic by approx. 33 % thanks to the use of railway transport.

SAKO is an independent subject owned by the City of Brno. Financing will be ensured from commercial and European banks without any burden on the city or taxpayers.

At the time of the project initiation phase (2021) the expected investment costs were CZK 2.3 billion.

The plant modernization will not affect the charge. The Brno City Municipality is responsible for setting the charge; we do not expect the price to rise due to this project. 

We aim to make the energy recovery from waste affordable for all of our suppliers and with sufficient incentive effect. We do not plan any substantial change in the incineration charge.

It is the utilization of waste for the purpose of production of heat and electric power, these are then further supplied to consumers. Besides, primary raw materials – ferrous and non-ferrous metals – are separated from the waste, intended for further recycling.

An incinerator is a device in which waste is only incinerated without production of the energy. It is just the burning of the waste. The waste-to-energy plant recovers energy from waste to produce heat and electric power. Concerning efficiency, the project intends to go beyond the standard concept of combined heat and power production. This technology can be described as a high-efficient combined heat and power facility utilizing renewable sources.

What are the advantages of energy recovery from waste?

• / utilization of thermal energy released during the incineration process for heat and electric power production
• / savings in primary non-renewable raw material and energy sources
• / waste weight reduction to 25 % of its original values
• / reduction of volume of the waste by 90 % of its original values
• / efficient and straightforward control of the incineration process; waste is entirely reduced to the inert inorganic material 
• / the bottom ash containing a minimum amount of organic residues (1–5 %)
• / environmentally harmful substances can be better managed and safely disposed of. The residues from the flue gas treatment system amount to 3-4 % of the waste entering the plant.
• / separation of ferrous and non-ferrous metal 

It is an inert inorganic material – bottom ash. Ferrous and non-ferrous materials are further separated from that. Therefore, 60,000 tons of bottom ash, 4,000 tons of iron and 280 tons of non-ferrous metals are obtained annually.

Teplárny Brno (district heating operator) is and will continue to be our consumer. In September 2020, the memorandum on cooperation was signed with Teplárny Brno leading to increase in heat supply to the district heating system. Thanks to energy from waste, Brno will reduce its dependence on a fossil energy source – natural gas.

We do not exhaust primary non-renewable energy sources, such as crude oil, natural gas or coal.

Moreover, only the waste which cannot be recycled is utilized for energy recovery. According to the EU legislation, the biodegradable fraction of municipal and industrial waste is considered biomass, thus a renewable energy source. 

The new project will fulfil all the EU requirements stated in the document "Best available techniques for waste incineration (BAT)." As part of the environmental impact assessment known as EIA, which is of mandatory nature for this project, important impacts related to emissions, noise, climate, public health or lighting were assessed. The conclusion of this assessment is exclusion of any negative effect on the environment.

Moreover, the project will help fulfill the objective to "Reduce emissions in the Czech Republic by 2030 by at least 44 Mt of CO_2eq eq in comparison with 2005". Together with that project will contribute to the limitation of landfills, which will result in a reduced amount of direct and indirect emissions of greenhouse gases produced from 132,000 tons of waste/year. Additionally, CO₂ emissions will be reduced thanks to the recovery of energy from waste, which will not be used from crude oil or natural gas. The other benefit is the recycling of ferrous and non-ferrous metals. The total CO₂ savings will amount up to 160 thousand tons per year.

Regarding flue gas, everything is continually monitored and analyzed. The entire flue gas treatment process is automatically controlled so that the residual content of monitored harmful substances is lower than the emission limits allowed. The rate of flue gas treatment of pollutants is at the level of 99 %. For information on emission load, see our website HERE.

Advanced waste management systems combine prevention, recycling and Waste-to-Energy. The plant uses only non-reusable and non-recyclable waste and turns it into energy. In the broader region, the capacity for processing waste of this type is not sufficient. Inhabitants of the City of Brno will benefit from cheap, available heat and electric power, both produced from the waste.

Independently of this project, the SAKO Brno company is implementing a new project called "The Brno Centre for Material Use of Waste (ITI)" with an automatic line for final sorting with a capacity of 15,000 tons of waste per year. This line will enable and support qualitative and quantitative levels of separated components and help fulfill recycling objectives.

The situation will not differ from the current one. The level of risk to the citizens' health owing to exposure to the indicated substances at the given values of immission contributions will not change. The actual changes in immission contributions resulting from the source's increased capacity are below the resolution limit. No conclusive changes in noise load resulting from the facility is anticipated; therefore, the project causes no rise either in the health risk level or in the rate of nuisance and disturbance during night.