576562

research-article2015

WMR0010.1177/0734242X15576562Waste Management & ResearchInglezakis et al.

Original Article

Comparison between landfill gas and

waste incineration for power generation
in Astana, Kazakhstan

Waste Management & Research

2015, Vol. 33(5) 486494
The Author(s) 2015
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DOI: 10.1177/0734242X15576562
wmr.sagepub.com

Vassilis J Inglezakis, Luis RojasSolrzano, Jong Kim,

Aisulu Aitbekova and Aizada Ismailova

Abstract
The city of Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, which has a population of 804,474, and has been experiencing rapid growth over the last
15 years, generates approximately 1.39 kg capita-1 day-1 of municipal solid waste (MSW). Nearly 700 tonnes of MSW are collected
daily, of which 97% is disposed of at landfills. The newest landfill was built using modern technologies, including a landfill gas (LFG)
collection system.
The rapid growth of Astana demands more energy on its path to development, and the viability analysis of MSW to generate
electricity is imperative. This paper presents a technicaleconomic pre-feasibility study comparing landfill including LFG utilization
and waste incineration (WI) to produce electricity. The performance of LFG with a reciprocating engine and WI with steam turbine
power technologies were compared through corresponding greenhouse gases (GHG) reduction, cost of energy production (CEP),
benefitcost ratio (BCR), net present value (NPV) and internal rate of return (IRR) from the analyses. Results demonstrate that in the
city of Astana, WI has the potential to reduce more than 200,000 tonnes of GHG per year, while LFG could reduce slightly less than
40,000 tonnes. LFG offers a CEP 5.7% larger than WI, while the latter presents a BCR two times higher than LFG. WI technology
analysis depicts a NPV exceeding 280% of the equity, while for LFG, the NPV is less than the equity, which indicates an expected
remarkable financial return for the WI technology and a marginal and risky scenario for the LFG technology. Only existing landfill
facilities with a LFG collection system in place may turn LFG into a viable project.
Keywords
Landfill, waste incineration, electricity production, municipal waste, Astana, Kazakhstan

Introduction
Municipal solid waste (MSW) disposal in most developing
countries around the world poses major environmental problems.
Insufficient collection and inadequate disposal systems result in
environmental and public health problems. To face the future
problems in waste management, and to meet the growing demand
of energy with low or zero environmental impact, it is necessary
to consider the conversion of the waste into energy. There are
several technologies that can be used to produce energy from
waste, among which landfill gas (LFG) and waste incineration
(WI) are the most popular ones. Both technologies are already
implemented at large scale in Europe and the US (Department
for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), 2013;
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), 2013).
Regarding LFG, most of the waste generated by human daily
activities is sent to landfills. Within one year of the initial deposit
of waste, the LFG produced by the decomposition of waste
should be exploitable with a composition of approximately 50%
methane and 50% carbon dioxide, with roughly 1% of other
organic and inorganic compounds (EPA, 2008).

On the other hand, WI for power and/or heat generation is the

most common waste-to-energy implementation (European
Commission, 2006). Current regulations in Organization for
Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries,
where this technology is very popular, mandate the meeting of
strict emission standards, mostly on NOx, SOx, heavy metals and
dioxins (The European Parliament and the Council of the
European Union, 2000). Modern WI technologies may provide
1428% of energetic efficiency when only used for power generation (Ghougassian, 2012), but could reach up to 80% when,
in addition to power production, heating needs are met in cogeneration projects (Shipley et al., 2008). The WI technology
may reduce the volume of original waste by 9596%, depending
School of Engineering, Nazarbayev University, Republic of Kazakhstan
Corresponding author:
Vassilis J Inglezakis, School of Engineering, Nazarbayev University,
53 Kabanbay Batyr Ave., Astana 010000, Kazakhstan.
Email: vasileios.inglezakis@nu.edu.kz

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Inglezakis et al.
Table 1. Composition of household waste in Astana (Ministry of Regional Development, 2012).
Waste Type

Major Items

Percentage (at source)

Organic waste
Inert waste
Plastic

Vegetable and fruit parts, left-over foods, yard trimmings, wood

Rubble, ashes, yard sand, bones
Bottles, containers, polythene bags, parts of electrical and
electronic goods, worn-out tires
Cardboard, newspapers, old/torn books, ruffled paper
Cans, household utensils, wires, auto and bike
Clothes, footwear, bags, cuttings from tailoring shops

28%
12.4%
18.5%

Paper
Metal
Textile and leather
Landscaping waste
Construction waste
Glass

Bottles, drinking glass, jars, mirrors, louvers, auto

windscreens, computer monitor screens

on the composition of waste and the degree of recovery of the

substances, such as metals, from ash for recycling purposes
(Central Upper Peninsula Planning and Development Regional
Commission (CUPPAD), 2009).
Astana is the capital city of the Republic of Kazakhstan with
a population of approximately 804,474 (Inquiry Office Info
Tses, 2013). Waste management problems in Astana can be well
understood in light of rapid urbanization in many cities in
Kazakhstan. As the economic situation improves, with Astana
constituting approximately 8.5% of the total country gross
domestic product (GDP) of US$ 151.67 billion in 2011, the concerns for waste management rise, since a stronger economy often
leads to an increased waste production due to a higher purchasing
power (Mudrichenko, 2012; Predictor, 2013).
According to the most recent data (2012), about 1118 tonnes
of MSW are generated per day in the city and the collection
capacity is approximately 600800 tonnes (Ministry of Regional
Development, 2012). According to these data, waste generation
rates are 507 kg per person-year or 1.39 kg per person-day, while
waste collection rates are 365 kg per person-year or 1 kg per
person-day (72%). According to historical statistical data,
MSW generation is between 1.141.39 kg per person-day, without any clear growing or declining trend (Department of
Statistics of Astana City, 2013). Similar values are found in
other cities in developing countries, for example 1.62 kg per person-day in Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia, 2009), 1.11 kg per personday in Shanghai and 1.33 kg per person-day in Hong Kong
(China, 20062009) (Saeed et al., 2009; Zhang et al., 2010). The
composition of domestic waste in Astana is presented in Table 1.
According to the latest projections, production of MSW in the
period 20112025 in urban areas of Kazakhstan is likely to grow
by more than 50% along with the growth in prosperity
(Conception of Kazakhstan on Transition to Green Economy,
2013, 2013). This means that the annual waste growth rate is
expected to be at a level of 3.33%, higher than in other developing countries in Asia; for example, Malaysia has a rate of 2%
(Moh and Manaf, 2014).
The waste that is collected is processed in a mechanical
biological treatment (MBT) plant for sorting/composting or is
directed to the landfill. The waste processing complex Altyn-TET

13%
0.9%
9.8%
1.5%
1.4%
14.5%

LLP started its operation at the end of 2012 (Ministry of Regional

Development, 2012). In March 2013, the waste acceptance capacity of the plant was about 300380 tonnes per day. According to
the current planning (early 2014), the waste acceptance capacity
of the plant will be increased to 600800 tonnes per day. Despite
plans for future implementation of separation at source (at home),
treatment of separated recyclable materials in the same facility
and the possibility of installing a biogas plant (anaerobic digestion) for organic waste treatment in the same operating facility,
none of those processes are considered in the assessment
presented in this work. Some of the current policies and legislation that guide the management of solid waste include the
Environmental code of the Republic of Kazakhstan (with alterations and amendments as of 17 Jul 2009) (2009) and the Order of
the Ministry of Health of the Republic of Kazakhstan No. 555
dated 28 July 2010 on the approval of sanitary rules for sanitary
facilities requirements for domestic purposes (2010).
Presently, Kazakhstan, as a subscriber to the Kyoto Protocol,
has proposed its average yearly emissions to be 90% of 1990
levels during the period of 20132020 (Climate Action Tracker,
2013). However, there are no tax reliefs or incentives in the management of waste and the procurement of waste treatment equipment, and current implemented policies are expected to increase
emissions even further. Additionally, the present electricity
export rate in the Republic of Kazakhstan is around 70 US$ per
MWh for co-generation systems (Astanaenergosbyt, 2014), and
an electricity escalation rate equal to the inflation rate is assumed.
The objective of this paper is to assess and compare the performance of LFG and WI to energy projects in Astana, in terms of
technical, environmental and economic criteria. The assessment
will account for the amount of energy generated, emissions
reduction, investment and operation costs and the financial outcome of both options using a very common configuration found
in each case.

Materials and methods

LFG for power generation
LFG generation modelling.The Scholl Canyon model (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), 1996) is a

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Waste Management & Research 33(5)

popular and properly validated model utilized to estimate the

potential for LFG generation of a given landfill site. This model
has been previously used in many pre-feasibility and feasibility
analyses of LFG to power systems with very satisfactory results.
Over 1300 publications refer to RETScreen software with the
majority of publications focusing on clean energy policy options
(RETScreen International, 2012). Not all the LFG can be captured, but for engineered LFG facilities, an efficiency value
between 5075% is reasonable and can be achieved in Astanas
LFG facility. In fact, an efficiency of 75% of LFG facilities was
reported as expected in design and performance standards by the
British Columbia Ministry of Environment (2010) and it is the
standard assumed by the EPA for engineered landfills. The World
Bank (2004) suggests a value of k = 0.03 yr-1 for the conditions
observed in the city of Astana, annual precipitation of 300 mm
and moderately decomposable waste, since there is 28% organic
waste (National Natural Park Burabay, 2014). In the absence of
data, the EPA recommends to use, for pre-feasibility approximations, Lo = 170 m3 of methane per tonne of waste. Therefore, in
this study, the typical Lo value will be used.
System configuration. LFG is collected and treated in order to
use the methane for power generation. Methane is 25 times more
powerful as a greenhouse gas (GHG) than CO2 (EPA, 2010) in a
100-year time-frame; therefore, energy will not only be produced, but GHG emission will also be reduced. The use of LFG
for power generation consists of three main stages: collection,
pre-treatment and power generation (Energy Sector Management
Assistance Program, 2009). For the forthcoming analysis, the
collection system is considered as already existent in the landfill
facility and capital costs will consider only the biogas pre-treatment and the acquisition of a specially-tuned, medium-speed,
lean-burn gas engine with operation under the following premises: (a) always at full capacity during operating hours (no partial
load allowed); (2) a heat rate of 8000 kJ kWh-1 and (3) 8000
hours of operation per year (restricted only due to regular maintenance routines).

WI for power generation

Despite the fact that Kazakhstan is not a member of the OECD,
the country is firmly attached to the idea of becoming a green
energy country by the end of this decade (Conception of
Kazakhstan on Transition to Green Economy, 2013, 2013) and,
therefore, WI technology will be considered here as if it were to
fulfil the more strict environmental standards in the developed
world. In particular, in this work, the WI is considered as dedicated to boil water within a Rankine cycle to produce power from
a steam turbine. In spite of Kazakhstan having a relatively welldeveloped network of district heating, comprised of 40 combined
heat and power (CHP) plants that provide district heating to 70%
of inhabitants in 29 cities, these plants and district heating systems
date back to 19601980 and are very likely not capable to easily
take new heating sources being connected to them (Danish Board
of District Heating (DBDH), 2014). Therefore, in this analysis,
only the power supply will be considered from the WI technology.
The fundamental premises observed in the dimensioning of the

power cycle are as follows: (1) 8400 hours of operation per year
(limited only due to maintenance routines); (2) 750C / 72 bars
superheated steam at the entrance of the turbine; (3) a back pressure (condenser) of 20 kPa; (4) a steam turbine efficiency of 80%
and (5) a boiler seasonal efficiency of 75%. The next sections present the different aspects to be considered in the analysis of the WI
system.
Fuel potential. The quality of the combustion from waste fuel
depends on the energy content of the waste, measured as its
higher heating value (HHV) or lower heating value (LHV).
These two concepts are well known for most fossil fuels and are
related to the amount of heat released by the complete combustion of the fuel, with and without considering non-condensed
steam in the combustion products, respectively (Finet, 1987). In
this analysis, the LHV is proposed, which is considered to be
attractive when it has at least a value of 6 MJ kg-1 all year with
an average of 7 MJ kg-1 throughout the year (Haukohl, Rand and
Marxen, 1999). According to the same authors, the annual
amount of waste for incineration should be no less than 50,000
metric tonnes, and the weekly variations in the waste supply to
the plant should not exceed 20% as basic conditions for a municipal WI plant. The furnace must be designed for stable and continuous operation and complete burnout of the waste and flue
gases (i.e. carbon monoxide (CO) < 50 mg Nm-3, total organic
carbon (TOC) < 10 mg Nm-3) (Nussbaumer, 2003).
From the waste composition data, presented by Magrinho
and Semiao (2008), and the waste disposal rate (tonne yr-1), the
moisture content was calculated using the mass fraction of MSW
and the results are shown in Table 2. This step is called the proximate analysis. The next step is the ultimate analysis where the
dry weight of the feed waste is multiplied by the chemical fractions (Magrinho and Semiao, 2008). This process estimates the
waste composition, which includes carbon, hydrogen, oxygen,
nitrogen, sulphur and ash, of the feed municipal waste in a dry
basis. By using the modified Dulong formula for biomass fuel
(Babcock & Wilcox Co., 2005), the LHV can be found from the
feed waste chemical composition and moisture content. The fuel
potential of the WI is the total heat produced (GJ hour-1) in the
furnace as the product of the dry mass of feed waste and the corresponding LHV.
GHG emissions from WI. One of the main aspects to be assessed
in this project is the GHG emissions reduction associated to each
of the two technologies of energy production from waste in relation to the conventional electricity production in Astana. The
GHG emissions reduction is an important criterion of the prefeasibility report. The emission per mass of waste burned is converted to the emission per energy produced using the fuel
potential and the waste feed rate in the process. For the amount of
municipal waste to be incinerated, the estimated emission factor
of N2O in a continuous incinerator is 50 gr N2O tonne-1 of waste
of wet mass and the CO2 emission is estimated by using equation
(1) (Guendehou et al., 2006). The value of 44/12 in the equation
is the mass conversion factor from C to CO2. The fossil carbon
fraction is assumed as 35% for this calculation and additionally
the CH4 emission factor was assumed as zero (Wikner, 2009).

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Inglezakis et al.
Table 2. Fraction (%) of water, combustibles and ash of
municipal solid waste (MSW) (Magrinho and Semiao, 2008).
Waste Part

Water

Combustibles*

Ash

Paper
Plastic
Textiles
Wood
Yard waste
Other fuel waste
Glass
Metals
Other waste materials
and fines

23
20
10
20
65
10
2
3
20.5

72.55
74.24
87.75
78.4
33.43
78.66
1.08
9.22
36.58

4.45
5.76
2.25
1.6
1.58
11.34
96.92
87.79
42.92

*Combustible components are carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen

and sulphur.

This last assumption represents the advantage of WI in averting

methane release to the atmosphere (Systems Engineering &
Assessment (SEA) Ltd, 2009).

CO2 Emission =

( SW dm CF FCF ) ( 44 / 12) (1)

i

where
SWi = feed waste type i based on wet mass (tonne yr-1);
dmi = dry mass fraction in the waste of type i;
CFi = carbon mass fraction in the dry matter of waste type i;
FCFi = fraction of fossil carbon in the total carbon and
i = type of waste incinerated.
System configuration. The general set-up of the facilities in the
power generation system for the waste incinerator considered in
this case study consists of five stages: pre-treatment, incineration, heat recovery, energy production and emission control.
RETScreen simulation.The assessment was performed using
RETScreen simulation software (RETScreen International,
2012). The LHV was adopted as the reference in the estimation
of the heating value. The electricity generation was simulated
using a reciprocating engine for LFG and steam turbine for WI as
previously indicated. Both technologies were designed to receive
270,000 tonnes yr-1 of waste disposal and both were analysed on
a life span of 25 years for the project duration as usual for similar
technologies (The City of Calgary, 2012).
Energy model for LFG. Based on existing and projected engineered landfills in Astana, the input data for the analysis was collected and summarized in Table 3. From these fixed parameters,
the LFG generation curve is plotted and subsequently used to
select the capacity of the reciprocating engine.
Energy model for WI.Several steam turbine cycle operating
parameters were taken from Udomsri et al. (2011) and RETScreen
International (2012). The availability of the system was chosen
from the maximum value of the new power system, and the seasonal efficiency value was taken from the steam turbine model
suggested by RETScreen International (2008). Power system characteristics (steam flow, operating pressure and turbine efficiency)

Table 3. Landfill conditions in Astana.

Parameter

Year landfill opened*

Year landfill will be closed*
Size (acres)**
Waste disposal rate (tonnes yr-1)***
Methane generation constant k (yr-1)
Methane by volume of landfill gas (LFG) (%)****
Methane generation Potential Lo (m3 tonnes-1)
LFG collection efficiency (%)*****

2015
2040
124
270,000
0.03
50
170
75

*Obtained from private communication with local landfill authorities

in 2014.
**Irgibayev (2010).
***Obtained from private communication with authorities of the
waste processing complex at Altyn-TET LLP in 2014.
****EPA (2014) and RETScreen International (2008).

were calculated by matching the waste fuel potential and using

typical operation setting values.
Emission analysis model. In the city of Astana, currently 100%
of the electricity is generated by thermal power plants using coal
as a primary source of energy (Astanaenergosbyt, 2013); therefore, emissions related to coal will be the baseline in the calculations of any GHG reductions. In the estimation of GHG emissions
by each evaluated technology, all the emissions are finally
reported in equivalent carbon dioxide (CO2) terms, despite emission factors in kg GJ-1 of CO2, methane (CH4) and nitrogen oxide
(N2O) being introduced in the initial calculation. In that regard,
CH4 and N2O emissions account for 25 and 298 times those of
CO2, respectively, according to the IPCC (2007). As for the base
case in the assessment of the reduction of emissions in the LFG
project, it is considered that the collection system is already in
place, and currently all collected LFG is totally flared.
Cost analysis model.In this model, all costs related to the
project are summed into two main groups of expenses, which
are initial costs and annual costs. Initial costs and annual costs
were partially taken from the EPA (2008) and Udomsri et al.
(2010) and adjusted for 2014-US$ values by applying consumer
price index (CPI) inflation indices (United States Department
of Labor, 2014).
Financial summary model.The inflation rate in Kazakhstan
was taken as 5.4% per annum based on data from September
2013 (The National Bank of Kazakhstan, 2013). The central bank
discount rate was 5.5% per annum based 31 December 2012 data
(Trading Economics, 2013). The discount rate was taken as 9%,
which is considered conservative for this case. The annual nominal interest rate in foreign currency (US$) was taken as 4.5%
(Kazakhstan Deposit Insurance Fund, 2013). The debt ratio was
assumed as 50% and a debt term of 10 years was used.

Results and discussion

Power generation comparison
The chemical composition on the dry basis of the feed waste was
determined by performing the ultimate analysis. The procedure

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Waste Management & Research 33(5)

Figure 1. Landfill gas (LFG) generation graph (as obtained from the RETScreen simulation model). The y-axis is the energy
amount (GJ h-1) produced by the gas, and the x-axis is the year.

for the determination of the chemical composition on the dry

basis was explained previously in the section Fuel potential,
which is fundamental to determining the LHV obtained from
the WI.
The WI power system capacity was adjusted and this capacity
includes the following: a waste feed rate of 270,000 tonnes yr-1, a
dry weight of feed waste of 183,600 tonnes yr-1, a LHV of 14.25
MJt-1 and a fuel potential of 298.6 GJh-1 and 290 GJh-1 of required
fuel for the proposed design. The power output of the steam
power plant is 20.75 MW, with a resultant thermal efficiency of
25%. As a design criterion, the fuel required should not exceed
the fuel potential.
The sizing of the reciprocating engine is taken from the predicted amount of LFG to be produced during the life of the landfill as plotted in Figure 1.
Notice that the recovered LFG by the engineered system is
not completely used since the installed engine has a fixed full
capacity operation under the peak generation of the LFG facility. The unused LFG is the area between the potential and the
required curves in Figure 1. This unused collected LFG will
be flared and, therefore, not utilized for power production.
Notice, also, that LFG collection represents approximately 50%
of the methane collection given the expected composition of the
collected gas.

Environmental impact comparison

The results show that the GHG emission reduction from the WI
was 203,096 tonnes yr-1 CO2, while for the LFG system, the
reduction was 37,290 tonnes yr-1 CO2, showing a significant
difference (5.5 times larger) in favour of the WI system in this
aspect.

Financial comparison
As a consequence of having a larger power system, the WI system presents higher initial costs (when considering the power
system, the balance of the system and miscellaneous items), as
indicated in Table 4. The initial cost also determined the amount
of debt to be paid annually. This debt payment increased the total
annual cost of each project during the loan term. WI rendered an
energy production cost, in year 0 values, of 58.33 US$ MWh-1,
whereas LFG rendered 61.67 US$ MWh-1, a 5.7% more expensive solution. Table 4 depicts initial costs, annual savings and
costs at year 0 values.
It is important to recall that Table 4 presents costs at year 0
values, which are indexed at the inflation rate of 5.4% annually,
while the annual income has its origin in the electricity savings
which are indexed with the energy escalation rate of 5.4%
(assuming that both the inflation and electricity escalation rate
are the same, which is a conservative scenario). In addition, the
annual cost reflects the presence of the debt payment, which
will keep a constant value throughout the years and will end in
year 10.
As presented in Table 5, both projects depict a moderatehigh
level of profitability with differences in favour of WI regarding
the three indicators (net present value (NPV), benefitcost ratio
(BCR) and the internal rate of return (IRR) on equity).

Sensitivity analyses
As part of the global analysis of the technologies, it is convenient
to evaluate the sensitivity of the financial results to potential variations in the input parameters due to uncertainties in the prediction of economic factors and physical factors. In this study, a

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Inglezakis et al.
Table 4. Project cost and income comparison (at year 0 values).
Cost Breakdown

Landfill Gas (LFG)

Waste Incineration (WI)

Initial Cost
Power System
Balance of System and Miscellaneous
Items
Supervision of Construction plus
Training plus Commissioning
Total Initial Cost
Annual Cost and Debt Payments
Operation and Maintenance (O&M)
Debt Payment 10 years
Total Annual Cost
Annual Income

US$
US$

7,743,889
3,518,161

7,822,968
19,916,252

US$

190,000

190,000

US$

11,452,050

27,929,220

US$
US$
US$
US$

1,350,000
723,648
2,073,648
2,240,000

8,645,633
1,764,831
10,410,464
12,200,021

Table 5. Financial results comparison.

Financial Results

Landfill Gas
(LFG)

Waste
Incineration (WI)

Internal Rate of Return

(IRR) on Equity
Net Present Value (NPV)
BenefitCost Ratio (BCR)

13.8%

23.2%

US$ 4,433,743
1.77

US$ 33,831,548
3.42

sensitivity analysis is performed based on the following: (a)

potential variations in the Lo (waste potential LFG generation
capacity (m3 tonne-1)) within +/-15% of the value used to predict
the LFG produced, maintaining the rest of the input parameters
as their default values and (b) potential variations of all economic
factors within a +/-15% range to explore, via Monte Carlo sampling the range of variations of the financial indicators for both
technologies. These results are presented in the following two
sections.

Sensitivity of the LFG project to variations

of +/-15% in Lo
A sensitivity analysis based on -15% variations in Lo showed that
despite the decrease in the value of this parameter, the production
of LFG is still enough to run the engine and, therefore, it does not
affect the financial outcome. A sensitivity analysis based on +15%
variations in Lo showed that although the system generates more
LFG, there are also no changes in the financial outcome.

Sensitivity of the LFG and WI projects

to variation of +/-15% in the economic
parameters
The results of the sensitivity analysis performed on after-tax IRR
on equity for both projects are presented in Figure 2 in the form
of tornado charts.
Figure 2(a) indicates that the electricity export rate has the
strongest impact on after-tax IRR on equity. The positive relative
impact means that an increase in the electricity export rate leads
to an increase in IRR on equity and vice versa. Initial costs and

operation and maintenance (O&M) costs have modestly different

impact on after-tax IRR on equity and are about half as important
as the electricity export rate. The negative relative impact of
these parameters means the opposite: increased initial costs and
O&M costs lead to reductions in IRR on equity. Among the six
economic parameters, the debt interest rate and the debt term
have the least impact on IRR on equity. Figure 2(b) indicates
approximately the same relative impacts of economic parameters
on after-tax IRR on equity in the WI project as for the LFG project. The sensitivity analysis on the two projects allows us to
establish that electricity export rate, initial costs and O&M
parameters must be much more carefully gathered in order to
minimize the risk of error in the estimation of the output in the
real project. Similarly, the sensitivity analysis was performed for
the two projects to examine the effects of the economic parameters on the equity payback. Figure 3 presents the results.
The largest impact on the equity payback is caused by the
electricity export rate. The negative direction of the relative
impact indicates that a decrease in the export rate leads to an
increase in the payback period and vice versa. The second largest impact lies with the O&M costs. The positive direction indicates the opposite; with an increase in O&M costs, the equity
payback period increases. For both projects, the debt interest
rate and the debt ratio have a very small impact. The sensitivity
analysis allows us to establish that among the six explored input
parameters, the electricity export rate, O&M and initial costs
have to be more carefully selected to produce accurate results in
a feasibility study.

Selection between LFG and WI

It can be observed that a larger reduction of GHG can be obtained
by WI; despite LFG being marginally environmentally friendly,
the reduced CO2-e emissions are substantially smaller (5.5. times
smaller than WIs emissions). Both technologies will generate
profit above the hurdle rate (9%), but LFG leads to a cost of
energy production (CEP) that is 5.7% larger than the cost obtained
for WI. However, in terms of IRR on equity, the larger rate
obtained by the WI results (23.2%) is significantly more
attractive than the 13.8% rate obtained by LFG. Additionally, WI

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Waste Management & Research 33(5)

Figure 2. The relative impact of the economic parameters on after-tax internal rate of return (IRR) on equity for (a) the landfill
gas (LFG) project and (b) the waste incineration (WI) project. O&M: operation and maintenance.

Figure 3. The relative impact of the economic parameters on the equity payback for (a) the landfill gas (LFG) project and (b)
the waste incineration (WI) project. O&M: operation and maintenance.

renders a BCR of 3.42, which is about twice the BCR for LFG
(1.77). Despite the energy production via LFG proving to be still
marginally feasible by four percentage points above the discount
rate, the WI shows strong positive feasibility with an IRR on
equity of 23.2%. The NPV results are relatively acceptable for

both technologies, but they are much more attractive for WI, in
comparison to the equity of the project and reflected, of course,
in the BCR. Against LFG, there is an extra factor associated with
the costs, since these facilities are area intensive. For example,
landfills including LFG utilization require approximately 124

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Inglezakis et al.
acres of land compared to the 35 acres required by WI in the current application.

Conclusions
LFG and WI are potentially good to excellent waste-to-energy
solutions, respectively, in Astana. The WI technology offers a
promising outstanding financial performance and a significant
reduction of GHG emissions. The application of this technology in the context of waste management in Astana could be a
turning point towards sustainable development. Based on the
model predictions, WI is a much better option than LFG,
regarding the CEP, the NPV and the BCR. Additionally, the
fact that LFG requires a much larger land space has to be
accounted for, but current engineered landfill facilities in
Astana could be used without needing extra space. If the extension of the project to other cities in Kazakhstan without landfills is considered in the future, the space availability and the
overall costs and savings must be oriented to develop WI technologies, and WI has proven to be the better option among the
two considered in this study. Nevertheless, a feasibility analysis is now required to obtain a determinant answer to the viability of these two technologies.

Funding
This research received no specific grant from any funding agency in
the public, commercial or not-for-profit sectors.

Declaration of conflicting interests

The authors report on conflict of interest.

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