Potentials of food wastes for power generation and energy conservation in Taiwan

Food waste is approximately 20-30% of the household garbage in Taiwan. There are several ways to use recycled food waste, swine feeding and composting are the two main ways in Taiwan. The objective of this study was to evaluate the potentials of food wastes for power generation and energy conservation in Taiwan. The assessment was conducted by using the related statistics of Taiwan. The results showed that the total amount of food wastes recycled increased from 167,304 to 570,176 Mg y(-1) (+240%) during the period from 2003 to 2006, and increased from 139,614 to 452,550 Mgy(-1) (+224%) and from 22,290 to 112,666 Mg y(-1) (+405%) for swine feeding and composting during the same period, respectively. Potential of food wastes for power generation was 68.0 GWhy(-1), and that excluding swine feeding and composting were 14.0 and 54.5 GWh y(-1) in Taiwan in 2006, respectively. On the other hand, energy conservation potential of food wastes for compost production was 122 MWhy(-1), comparing with energy consumption of chemical fertilizer (ammonium sulfate and calcium superphosphate) production in Taiwan in 2006. The results also suggested that food wastes recycled can not only reduce the amount of the garbage, but also showed the potentials for power generation and energy conservation. (C) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.