The Project aims at building a temporary pilot application on productive scale in order to mine parts of existing landfills and to separate useful materials and produce suitable products (concentrates), both ferrous and non-ferrous, which can be fed into a metallurgical process.

 

The application will include preprocessing and processing production line, as well as a beneficiation stage for non-ferrous metals, introducing innovation elements from the mining industry.

 

The basic objective is to turn landfill mining (LFM) into a useful tool for the recovery of:

- materials, especially metals

- space, which equals to extra landfill capacity and lifetime in cases of expansion

- soil, which has been disposed off along with the waste and which is a natural resource valuable to local ecosystems as well as to landfill industry itself

- recyclables, like plastic and paper products, which can be either post-processed in a suitable recycling plant or burned in modern incinerators

- land, in the case of old landfills, which will lead to a successful rehabilitation scheme with minimal environmental footprint which, can be easily adapted to different waste compositions and site conditions.

 

At the same time, the Project objectives include the familiarization of the public with the issue of waste post-disposal processing and the potential of the procedure for metal recovery (thus lessening the need for mining interventions) and site rehabilitation, resulting in a cleaner environment and rational waste management.

 

The abovementioned objectives of material and/or energy recovery are widely known today in the waste processing industry and precede disposal, but have not been so far utilized in connection to (a) a wider program of waste post-disposal processing and (b) material beneficiation for valuable metals, bymeans of ore processing methods.