A Study on Mercury Emission Factor for Environmental Impact Assessment of Municipal Waste Incinerator

소각장 환경영향평가시 수은 배출 계수에 관한 연구

The amount of mercury emitted from an incinerator depends on the properties of waste, combustion condition, and control devices. Mercury concentration in air proportionates to the increase of incinerator installation. The purpose of this study is to provide a method for determination of mercury emission factor which can predict the amount of mercury emitted from each incinerator specifically. Case study was performed for N municipal waste incinerator. Based on the method presented in this paper, we obtained mercury emission factor as 1.85~1.95 g Hg/t at N Municipal Waste Incinerator and this result was regarded as reasonable when compared with existing mercury emission factor in reference cases. Fluorescent lamps turned out to be the most important source(44.4%) of mercury in municipal waste and its amount will tend to increase, while batteries become less significant. In addition, medical waste is one of the major source of mercury.