Biological Superabsorbents from fungi cell wall

Zygomycetes are a class of saprophytic fungi, which can grow on different waste materials. We are working on this class since 1999, and have several publications. They can grow in harsch conditions and produce several metabolites such as ethanol and lactic acid, or different enzymes. However, their cell mass has about 20% cell wall, which compose mainly of chitosan. Our PhD student Akram Zamani worked for several years on these fungi, in order to characterize their cell wall and produce superabsorbents from them. She defend her thesis soon. Let's wish her a good success during the defense and afterward in her life!


(The cover of her thesis, which shows the steps from fungi to superabsorbents)

Viva scavengers

Latin America with 524 million population, produces about 130 million tons wastes per year. Brazil with 1.152 kg/day/person wastes stands for haft of this wastes. This wastes is practically dumped, and just about 2% is recycled. This recycling is carried out mainly by scavengers that are about 100,000 families in Latin America, of which 10-30% are children and are working with slavery conditions, as we heard from our friends both at Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo universities. Recognition of their work by the governments in the region and more attention in the media and help by people, may help to increase their recycling from 2% to the corresponding level in Sweden which is about 35%.

(Treatment and final deposition of wastes in Brazil, Ref: Alvaro Cantanhede, UFRJ, Brazil)

Good business with landfill gas in Brazil

Together with our friends from University of Sao Paulo in Brazil, we visited today the old landfill of Sao Paulo named "Bandeirantes". This landfill received 50 million tons wastes in 1979-2007, and converted a valley to a hill with 150 m height of the wastes. The landfill is now closed to new wastes and covered. A company named "Biogas" collect the landfill gas via 300 wells and convert them to electricity via engines. They had about 14000 m3/h gas with about 49% methane, which is now reduced to about 6000 m3/h. They sells 10 MW electricity now. In addition, the company is registered to CDM to sell also the carbon emission credits, which was 2000 tons/day in 2007 and 700 tons/day now. The price of each ton equivalent CO2 saving is about 8-10 Euro. The company says its 50 million USD investment was paid back in 2 years. Good investment for both the companies involved and also the environment!


(Bandeirantes landfill in Sao Paulo, Brazil with 1.2 km2 and 150 m height of the waste. The wells for gas collection are visible in the photo)

Electricity from nuclear or municipal waste in Iran?

The nuclear dispute of Iran is a well known subject. In 1970s, the king decided to build a German nuclear power plant with Persian Gulf in Bushehr, a decision which was not changed after the revolution and is now finished with the help of the Russians. This plant with 1,000 MW capacity was fueled today after 35 years. On the other hand, the country produces approximately 35 million tons municipal solid wastes per year. My calculation show the possibility to produce 4,000 MW electricity from this waste in Iran, a material which is practically dumping today. Let's hope that Iran put its attention to develop waste to electricity in the future!

Biogas in Germany

The development of biogas in Germany has many similarities and possible debate as ethanol in the USA. Germans use mainly grains and energy crops to produce biogas. The number of the plants was 850 in 1999 and is nowadays around 5000 units. The major application of biogas in this country is burning the gas into electricity. I should congradulate our neibouring country for this success. However, an important point here is the efficiency of heat to electricity, that is about 30-50% by e.g. engines, turbines or fuel cells. It means Germans are missing 50-70% of the energy produced. We use this energy in Sweden in form of district heat.

7,000,000,000 tons per year carbon emissions

In the last 110 years, the global carbon emission has increased by about 14 times to more than 7,000,000,000 tons/year. The earth has no capacity to re-absorb this amount of carbon and might collapse, if we continue in the same way!


(Ref: Ekonomifakta)

His future?

Laos is a poor country located in Southeast Asia. However, the country and in particular its former capital, Luang Prabang, is a beautiful place with many turist attractions. We have recently visited this country and discussed with some municipalities and universities on waste refining and converting to resources. In this visit, I met this boy, whose family are scavengers and live among the waste in such poor country. You may think what would be his future?


(Picture from the landfill around Vientiane in Laos)

PhD in Resource Recovery

Swedish National Agency for Higher Education has recently approved University of Borås to examine PhD in Resource Recovery. It is an upgrading of our European Master Program in the same field, and also an approvement of high quality in our education and research in this field.

40,000 m3/hour biogas into the atmosphere

The recent leakage of oil in Mexican Gulf got a huge attention in the media. However, there are continuous threats to our environment that are generally forgotten or perhaps accepted. Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam has one of these threats. This megacity with about 8 millions inhabitants has two landfills, receiving about 2,000,000 tons/year wastes. I visited one of them, which was covered, so full anaerobic digestion occurs and results in methane gas. The pipes collect this gas and lead directly to the atmosphere. A rough calculation on the amount of the biogas from these landfills point to about 40,000 m3/hour gas production (3,000 million tons CO2-equivalent per year). It is a serious continuous threat to the global environment, while it can be collected and converted to electricity or fuels. Let's hope that our initiation to collaborate with the country on "Waste Recovery-International Partnership" lead to improve this condition and a better global environment!




(Landfill gas evolution in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam)

Geology (wastology): Mountains of garbage

It seems our colleagues in geology should add garbage as a new material for the montains and hills! This picture shows one of these mountains that is just 20 years old and is still growning with 70-80 tons/day. Let's see where it ends!


(The landfill site in Tan An city in Vietnam)