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SINGAPORE: Construction has begun on Tuas Nexus, Singapore’s first integrated water and waste treatment facility, the National Environment Agency (NEA) and PUB said in a joint press release on Tuesday (September 8).
The facility, which will be completed in phases starting in 2025, is a joint location of two mega facilities: the Tuas Water Recovery Plant (Tuas WRP) and the Integrated Waste Management Facility (IWMF), which will “help forge a more sustainable Singapore by optimizing land use and maximizing energy and resource recovery, ”the agencies said.
Tuas Nexus will be “energy self-sufficient,” according to the statement, taking advantage of the synergies of Tuas WRP and IWMF.
This is expected to result in carbon savings of more than 200,000 tons of carbon dioxide a year, which is equivalent to removing 42,500 cars from Singapore’s roads.
Furthermore, the integration of the two facilities will generate land savings of up to 2.6ha, roughly the size of four soccer fields, compared to building the two as separate facilities, the statement added.
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“By employing the latest technologies, Tuas Nexus will take advantage of the synergies of the water-energy-waste nexus of used water and solid waste.
“The by-product from one facility becomes a resource for the other facility,” explained PUB and NEA.
For example, IWMF’s Food Waste Treatment Facility will convert source segregated food waste into food waste slurry suitable for co-digestion with used water sludge at Tuas WRP.
Co-digestion of food waste and used water sludge will increase biogas production by 40 percent at Tuas WRP, compared to the biogas performance of used water sludge treatment alone.
The biogas produced will then be burned at IWMF and thermal energy from combustion will be recovered to improve the overall thermal efficiency of the plant and increase electricity generation, the agencies said.
The electricity generated by IWMF will be used to maintain Tuas Nexus operations and the excess will be exported to the grid. This excess electricity exported to the grid will be able to continuously power up to 300,000 four-bedroom HDB apartments.
THE MEGA FACILITIES
The Tuas WRP, PUB’s answer to “close the water circuit more effectively”, will have an initial treatment capacity of 800,000 m3 per day, the equivalent of 320 Olympic-size pools of water.
“Unlike conventional water treatment plants, it is equipped to receive both domestic and industrial wastewater streams from two separate deep tunnels for treatment,” according to the press release.
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For the first time in Singapore, the Tuas WRP will also be able to treat industrially used water to a “high enough standard” for industrial use, the agencies said.
Tuas WRP will also host the world’s largest membrane bioreactor facility.
“This will allow the plant to be more energy efficient while taking up less space compared to existing water treatment plants and will avoid the need for a long outfall to the sea,” said PUB and NEA.
A new water factory to be built on the rooftop of Tuas WRP will also “significantly boost” PUB’s NEWater water production capacity, “further ensuring a robust and resilient water supply for Singapore that can meet the growing demand for water. and cope with the impact of climate change. “
As for the IWMF, NEA’s “response plan” to meet Singapore’s solid waste management needs will be equipped with “cutting-edge technologies in solid waste treatment” to enhance energy and resource recovery from waste.
“It is Singapore’s first integrated facility to treat incinerable waste, segregated food waste and dewatered sludge from Tuas WRP, as well as to sort household recyclable materials collected under the National Recycling Program (NRP),” the agencies said.
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When fully completed, it will also be Singapore’s largest waste incineration plant.
“IWMF will also be the most energy efficient yet and, for the first time, will integrate an operational food waste treatment facility and a sludge incineration facility to achieve a higher food waste recycling rate and greater synergy with WRP operations.
“In addition, the IWMF automated Materials Recovery Facility will consolidate all recyclable materials collected under the NRP to achieve greater economies of scale, higher sorting efficiencies and recovery yields for various recyclable waste streams such as metals, paper and plastic.” said NEA and PUB.
“This will help boost Singapore’s overall recycling efforts and bring Singapore another step towards realizing its vision of zero waste.”
BUILDING TUAS NEXUS THE “SMART THING TO DO”: PUBLIC CHIEF EXECUTIVE
“We are building Tuas Nexus because it is the smartest thing to do, as the sum would be much greater than its two parts,” said PUB CEO Ng Joo Hee.
“I believe that Tuas Nexus advances the state of the art in sustainable urban waste management and resource recovery, and sets a new international benchmark for the field.”
The facility can bring Singapore closer to its vision of a zero waste nation, said NEA Executive Director Tan Meng Dui.
“Tuas Nexus is the world’s first totally new project that takes advantage of the synergies of shared use of two mega waste facilities for the treatment of water and waste.
“In addition to being part of an integrated Tuas Nexus facility, the IWMF, alone, will also be the largest, most advanced, efficient and integrated yet of our solid waste treatment facilities.
“The integrated facility paves the way for a more circular approach to resource management and brings us one step closer to realizing the vision of a zero waste nation,” he said.
