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The Industrial Green Game: Implications for Environmental Design and Management
The Industrial Green Game. 1997. Pp. 117–123.
Washington, D.C: National Academy Press.
The Industrial Symbiosis at Kalundborg, Denmark
HENNING GRANN
The concept of sustainable development is being widely referred to by politicians, industrialists, and the press. Although there is agreement in principle about the meaning of this concept, there are many and differing opinions as to what it means in practice and how the concept should be translated into specific actions.
The industrial symbiosis project at Kalundborg, Denmark (100 kilometers west of Copenhagen, population of approximately 15,000), is a model of environmental sustainability. It provides a vision of what is possible. The project has attracted a good deal of international attention, notably by the European Community, and been awarded several environmental prizes.
The symbiosis project, however, is not the result of a careful environmental planning process. It is rather the result of a gradual cooperative evolution of four neighboring industries and the Kalundborg municipality. Although begun by chance, the project has now developed into a high level of environmental consciousness in which the participants are constantly exploring new avenues of environmental cooperation.
What is industrial symbiosis? In short, it is a process whereby a waste product in one industry is turned into a resource for use in one or more other industries. It is the essence of a well-functioning ecosystem. The Kalundborg experience shows that cooperation among different industries in the use of waste increases the viability of the industries. At the same time, the demands from society for resource conservation and environmental protection are met.
Four industrial facilities—a power plant, an oil refinery, a plaster-board manufacturing plant, and a biotechnology production facility—and the local municipality participate in the Kalundborg symbiosis.
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OCR for page 117
The Industrial Green Game: Implications for Environmental Design and Management
The Industrial Green Game. 1997. Pp. 117–123.
Washington, D.C: National Academy Press.
The Industrial Symbiosis at Kalundborg, Denmark
HENNING GRANN
The concept of sustainable development is being widely referred to by politicians, industrialists, and the press. Although there is agreement in principle about the meaning of this concept, there are many and differing opinions as to what it means in practice and how the concept should be translated into specific actions.
The industrial symbiosis project at Kalundborg, Denmark (100 kilometers west of Copenhagen, population of approximately 15,000), is a model of environmental sustainability. It provides a vision of what is possible. The project has attracted a good deal of international attention, notably by the European Community, and been awarded several environmental prizes.
The symbiosis project, however, is not the result of a careful environmental planning process. It is rather the result of a gradual cooperative evolution of four neighboring industries and the Kalundborg municipality. Although begun by chance, the project has now developed into a high level of environmental consciousness in which the participants are constantly exploring new avenues of environmental cooperation.
What is industrial symbiosis? In short, it is a process whereby a waste product in one industry is turned into a resource for use in one or more other industries. It is the essence of a well-functioning ecosystem. The Kalundborg experience shows that cooperation among different industries in the use of waste increases the viability of the industries. At the same time, the demands from society for resource conservation and environmental protection are met.
Four industrial facilities—a power plant, an oil refinery, a plaster-board manufacturing plant, and a biotechnology production facility—and the local municipality participate in the Kalundborg symbiosis.
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The Industrial Green Game: Implications for Environmental Design and Management
The power plant, Denmark's largest, is owned by Asnæsværket. It is coal fired, has a capacity of 1,500 megawatts (mW), and employs about 600 people.
The oil refinery, Denmark's largest, is owned by Statoil. The refinery has a capacity of about 3 million tons per year (tons/yr) and is being expanded to a capacity of 5 million tons/yr. It employs about 250 people.
The plaster-board manufacturing plant, owned by Gyproc a.s., produces about 14 million square meters per year of plaster-board for the building industry. It employs about 175 people.
The biotechnology facility is owned by Novo Nordisk. The company produces about 45 percent of the world market of insulin and about 50 percent of the world market of enzymes. In addition, the company produces substantial quantities of growth hormones and other pharmaceutical products. Novo Nordisk operates in several countries, but the Kalundborg plant, with 1,100 employees, is the company's largest production site.
The Kalundborg municipality controls the distribution of water, electricity, and district heating in the Kalundborg city area.
DEVELOPMENT OF THE SYMBIOSIS
The symbiosis—or cooperative use of waste heat and materials—was not planned. The relationships that developed and are shown in Figure 1 evolved over a period of more than 20 years. A chronology of key events follows.
1959
The principal player, Asnæsværket, was started up.
1961
Tidewater Oil Company commissioned the first oil refinery in Denmark, and a pipeline was constructed from Lake Tissø to provide water for its operation. (The refinery was taken over by Esso in 1963 and acquired by Statoil in 1987 along with Esso's Danish marketing facilities.)
1972
Gyproc established a plaster-board manufacturing plant. A pipeline to supply excess refinery gas was constructed from the refinery to Gyproc facilities.
1973
The Asnæsvæket power was expanded. To meet increased water demand, an agreement was reached with the refinery to build a connection to the Lake Tissø-Statoil pipeline.
1976
Novo Nordisk started delivering biological sludge to neighboring farms by tank truck.
1979
The power plant started supplying fly ash (until then a troublesome waste product) to cement manufacturers such as Aalborg Portland located in northern Denmark.
1981
The Kalundborg municipality completed a district heating distribution
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The Industrial Green Game: Implications for Environmental Design and Management
FIGURE 1 The Kalundborg symbiosis.
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network within the city of Kalundborg utilizing waste heat from the power plant.
1982
Novo Nordisk and the Statoil refinery completed the construction of steam supply pipelines from the power plant. By purchasing process steam from the power plant, the companies were able to shut down inefficient steam boilers.
1987
The Statoil refinery completed a pipeline to supply its effluent cooling water to the power plant for use as raw boiler feed water.
1989
The power plant started to use the waste heat from its salt cooling water (+7-8°C) to produce trout and turbot at its local fish farm.
1989
Novo Nordisk entered into an agreement with the Kalundborg municipality, the power plant, and the refinery to connect to the water supply grid from Lake Tissø to meet Novo's rising demand for cooling water.
1990
The Statoil refinery completed the construction of a sulphur recovery plant. The elemental sulphur being recovered is being sold as a raw material to a sulfuric acid manufacturer located in Fredericia on the mainland of Yetland in Denmark.
1991
The Statoil refinery commissioned the building of a pipeline to supply biologically treated refinery effluent water to the power plant for cleaning purposes and for fly-ash stabilization.
1992
The Statoil refinery commissioned the building of a pipeline to supply refinery flare gas to the power plant as a supplementary fuel.
1993
The power plant completed a stack flue gas desulfurization project. This process converts sulphur dioxide (SO2) flue gas to calcium sulphate (or gypsum) which is sold to the Gyproc plaster-board plant, where it replaces imported natural gypsum. The new raw material from the power plant has increased the quality of plaster-board that is manufactured.
Future
The construction of green houses, to be supplied with residual heat, is being considered by the power plant and the refinery.
ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE SYMBIOSIS
The annual material and energy flows of the four industrial partners in the symbiosis are shown in Table 1. The reductions in resource consumption, emissions, and waste in this symbiotic relationship are shown in Table 2. The most significant achievements of the industrial symbiosis cooperation at Kalundborg are that:
there have been significant reductions in energy consumption and coal, oil, and water use;
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TABLE 1 Annual Materials and Energy Flows of the Four Industrial Partners in the Kalundborg Symbiosis
Industrial Partner
Production
Emissions
Resource Consumption
Asnæsværket
Electricity:
300,000,000 kWh
CO2:
4,300,000 tons
Water:
400,000 m3 (treated)
Process Steam:
355,000 tons
SO2:
17,000 tons
100,000 m3 (raw)
District heating:
700,000 GJ
NOx:
14,000 tons
700,000 m3 (re-used) cooling water from Statoil
Fly ash:
170,000 tons
500,000 m3 (re-used waste water from Statoil)
Fish:
200 tons
Coal:
1,600,000 tons
Gympsum:
80,000 tons
Oil:
25,000 tons
Gas:
5,000 tons (flare gas from Statoil)
Statoil Refinery
3,200,000 tons of a full range of fuel products
SO2:
1,000 tons
Water:
1,300,000 m3 (raw)
NOx:
200 tons
50,000 m (treated)
Waste Water:
500,000 tons
Steam:
140,000 tons (from Asnæsværket
Oil:
1.8 tons
189,000 tons (own waste heat)
Phenol:
0.02 tons
Gas:
80,000 tons
Oily Waste:a
300 tons
Oil:
8,000 tons
Electric:
75,000,000 kWh
Gyproc
14,000,000 m2 of plaster-board
N/A
Gypsum:
80,000 tons (from Asnæsværket)
33,000 tons (natural gypsum)
8,000 tons (from recycling)
Cardboard:
7,000 tons
Oil:
3,300 tons
Gas:
4,100 tons
Water:
75,000 tons
Electric:
14,000,000 kWh
Novo Nordisk
Industrial enzymes
Waste Water:
900,000 m3
Water:1,400,000 m3 (treated)
Insulin
COD:
4,700 tons
300,000 m3 (raw)
Nitrogen:
310 tons
Phosphorus:
40 tons
Steam:
215,000 tons
Electric:
140,000,000 kWh
kWH = kilowatt-hours; GJ = gigajoule; m2 = square meters; m3 = cubic meters
a The oily waste is biologically degraded at Statoil's sludge treatment facilities.
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TABLE 2 Results of the Kalundborg Symbiosis
Sources of Reduction
Total Reductions (tons/yr)
Resources
Oil
19,000
Coal
30,000
Water
1,200,000
Emissions
CO2
130,000
SO2
25,000
Waste
Fly ash
135,000
Sulfur
2,800
Gypsum
80,000
Nitrogen from biosludge
800
Phosphorus from biosludge
400
environmental impacts have been lessened through reductions in SO2 and CO2 emissions and improved quality of effluent water; and
traditional waste products such as fly ash, sulphur, biological sludge, and gypsum have been converted into raw materials for production.
The symbiosis has created a positive image of Kalundborg as a clean industrial city. Perhaps most significantly, there has been a gradual development of a systematic environmental "way of thinking" that may be applied to many other industrial settings and which may be used in planning new industrial complexes. The effective symbiosis at Kalundborg has a number of important characteristics (Box 1).
FUTURE DEVELOPMENTS
At Kalundborg, all future projects and/or process modifications will be considered for potential inclusion in the industrial symbiosis network. A number of interesting ideas have been identified for further study. In the meantime, the Kalundborg experience offers a practical model to examine ways to minimize the environmental impact from existing and new industrial complexes.
Traditionally, increase in industrial activity implies an almost linear increase in the load on the environment. The industrial symbiosis concept suggests that this need not necessarily be so. Indeed, under this model, increased industrial
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BOX 1
Characteristics of Kalundborg Symbiosis
• The participating industries are different but benefit mutually from utilizing each other's waste.
• The individual industry agreements are based on commercially sound principles.
• Environmental improvements, resource conservation, and economic incentives go hand in hand.
• The development of the symbiosis is voluntary but occurs in close cooperation with government authorities.
• Short physical distances between participating plants are advantageous.
• Short "mental" distances are equally important. Visions of possible beneficial links are critical.
• Mutual management understanding and cooperative commitment is essential.
• Effective communication between participants is required.
• Significant side benefits are achieved in other areas, such as safety and training.
activity may lead to fewer environmental impacts. The key lies in carefully selecting processes and combining industries that together may effectively utilize waste materials as production inputs and thus reduce environmental impacts. Kalundborg is an ideal situation that will be difficult to duplicate. Nevertheless, Kalundborg provides a vision of what can be achieved locally, regionally, and globally.
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