Waste made useful in Sharjah
An average person in the UAE generates three kilogrammes of trash every single day. Ever wondered what happens to all the waste after it is discarded?
Khaleej Times takes a closer look at Bee’ah, the fully integrated environmental and waste management company in the UAE. A public-private partnership, Bee’ah is responsible for collecting waste from over one million residents in Sharjah alone. The company’s waste collection team, Tandeef, employs more than 5,000 people and operates an advanced fleet of over 800 vehicles to accomplish this astonishing feat. Its innovative approach to the management of waste has helped to achieve a remarkable diversion rate of 70 per cent from the landfills in Sharjah.
Bee’ah holds contracts with regional and international entities including the Burj Khalifa, DWTC, Emaar, TECOM and Dubai Marina. A number of waste recycling facilities have been established within Bee’ah’s Waste Management Centre to recover and recycle various materials like paper, cardboard, plastics, metals and aluminum, and organic waste; with specialised facilities for other types of waste to follow soon.
Bee’ah’s material recovery facility, the third largest in the world, is one of the most sophisticated plants to process household waste. It mostly processes organic waste and polyethylene terephthalate —the most common type of plastic used for water bottles. The plant handles over 1,500 tonnes of municipal solid waste daily.
Bee’ah’s tyre recycling facility uses an advanced cryogenic method of processing. The plant processes over 9,000 tyres each day, which are shredded and separated to steel and rubber. The shredded rubber is then cooled using liquid nitrogen and converted into fine crumbs than can be used for making walking tracks and for other landscaping purposes.
The environmental management company’s construction and demolition waste recycling facility is one of the busiest plants in the region, thanks to the rapid development of the UAE. Used building blocks and steel from demolished buildings and leftover materials are processed in approximately 15 minutes. Using mammoth machinery, concrete and debris are broken down under great pressure to create an aggregate for roads, pavements and walkways. Processing over 6,000 tonnes of concrete, bricks and asphalt daily, the facility saves resources, conserves energy and alleviates the burden on landfills.
Bee’ah’s car and metal shredding facility features one of the most powerful shredding machines to date — The Red Giant. It weighs over 44 tonnes and can shred 60 car bodies per hour. The plant’s main purpose is to reuse old car bodies with the aim of segregating the individual metal, glass and plastic components for recycling.
Bee’ah is also establishing stateof-the-art facilities to generate renewable energy. In line with UAE Vision 2021, Bee’ah and Masdar are developing a cutting-edge waste-to-energy plant in Sharjah. The plant is expected to divert 300,000 tonnes of waste away from landfill every year, thus playing an instrumental role in achieving Bee’ah’s zero waste to landfill goal by 2020. The proposed plant will process over 37.5 tonnes every hour, to generate 35 MW of clean energy, powering thousands of homes with clean energy.