On March 1, STADLER Selecciona S.L.U. (a subsidiary of STADLER Anlagenbau GmbH) organised a press visit to the sorting plant at the municipal waste treatment centre (MSW) in Torija (Guadalajara, Spain), which was inaugurated in April 2023 within the framework of the Operational Programme Feder Castilla- La Mancha 2014-2020. Along with several members of the technical press, the event was attended by Óscar Ibares, Plant Director of UTE RSU Guadalajara; Carlos Manchado, Manager of Spain, Portugal, LATAM and New Markets and International Sales Director, together with Óscar Horcajada and Juan Ramírez also from the Spanish subsidiary, as well as Marina Castro and María Gebel, from the Marketing Department of the STADLER Anlagenbau GmbH plant.
The Torija MSW and packaging plant is part of the Consortium for Urban Waste Management in the province of Guadalajara (owned by the Guadalajara Provincial Council), which covers a territory of 288 municipalities and 21 communities (the whole of the province of Guadalajara). The Torija centre, managed by the UTE RSU Guadalajara, serves the whole province and receives waste directly from transfer plants in 22 municipalities. The facilities consist of a sorting plant, a composting plant, a leachate treatment plant and a landfill.
The programme started at 9 am with a welcome to the plant by Óscar Ibares. It continued with a presentation of STADLER by Carlos Manchado, who gave an overview of market trends, highlighting the growing pressure to reduce waste, both from citizens and non-governmental organisations; new legislative requirements, as well as the brake on exports to China and other countries.
After this point of view, Carlos Manchado informed the audience about the 70% increase of MSW in the next 30 years, which will lead to the upgrading of many plants at European level and summarised the experience and solutions that STADLER provides for this market. Some emblematic examples of the company were mentioned, such as the ROAF MSW Oslo (Norway), the PreZero Recycling Plant (Eitting, Germany), the INTEGRA Plant (Sofia, Bulgaria) and the Kunstoff Recycling Grünstadt Plant KRG (Germany). At the national level, the Sogama MSW plant (A Coruña, Spain), the ECOPARC 4 plant (Barcelona, Spain) and, of course, the Torija plant were highlighted.
In addition to designing and developing MSW plants, STADLER, in terms of machinery, provides 3 key products to the process: trommels, ballistic separators and conveyor belts.
Afterwards, and before starting the visit to the plant, Óscar Ibares and Carlos Manchado, together with Carlos Risco, Manager of the Guadalajara Urban Waste Consortium and Ismael Avilés, Operations Director of STADLER Selecciona. S.L.U., summarised the plant project in a dynamic question and answer session moderated by Nuria Martí, director of the communications agency Alarcon & Harris.
The good relationship between the management and the satisfaction with the project was demonstrated. Together they explained how the new plant was to be integrated into the existing building and process both MSW and light packaging and that in only 3 weeks, the STADLER team was able to dismantle the existing plant and proceed with the assembly of the new one in only 10 weeks, always on schedule.
Carlos Manchado said: ‘Without a doubt, one of our main challenges was to replace an existing plant. The design of the new plant had to be very well thought out to fit, so the preparation work of our engineers was key and proved to be very successful. In a second step, our assembly team had to work within the constraints of the limited space in the building. In addition, the project required civil works to be carried out by other companies, so communication and coordination as a team was essential.
Carlos Risco, Manager of the Guadalajara Urban Waste Consortium, said: ‘The difficulties of dismantling and rebuilding in a confined area and with limited height were a real challenge that STADLER managed with skill’.
Óscar Ibares agreed and added: ‘The STADLER team was flexible and understood our requests, always adapting to our needs. The collaboration between the two teams has been very effective, and we appreciate it very much.
The plant will have the capacity to operate efficiently for the next 10 to 15 years.
“In this project we have always worked under the principle of efficiency and the current plant foresees the possibility of extending lines or adding equipment if needed in the future,” added Carlos Risco.
Visit to the improved plant in Torija: an improved process
The presentation was followed by a tour of the plant, where the attendees were able to see first-hand the work that is done there and the main stages of the process.
The sorting process starts with trommels and an STT5000 ballistic separator that separates MSW waste, mixed commercial waste and bulky waste. It is followed by three optical separators for PET, HDPE, PLASTICS MIX (PS, PP and other plastics such as PVC) and TetraPaks and magnet and eddy-current separators. The recovered materials are stored and packed for sale.
Carlos Manchado emphasised: “The automation of the sorting process, with a new trommel, our STT5000 ballistic separator and three optical sorters, has been key to increasing the plant's capacity from 35 t/h of MSW to 40 t/h, and from 1.5 t/h of light packaging to 4 t/h. It also translates into a more efficient process and a higher purity of the final recovered material, which in the case of MSW has gone from <50% to 90% and in light packaging from <90% to >95%.”
A team Project
The team wanted to conclude the visit with thanks before visiting the castle of Torija and ending the day with a meal at the Asador Pocholo.
“I would like to thank the STADLER team, from Mr. Willi Stadler to the last worker involved in the project, for their professionalism. Their good teamwork has allowed us to complete this project with a high degree of satisfaction of the end user, i.e. the Consortium and the UTE RU Guadalajara that manages the installation”, said Óscar Ibares.
“For STADLER, being awarded the contract as a turnkey company for the plant was key because of the importance of having a reference centre like this in Guadalajara. I would like to thank the good coordination between all parties from the beginning and, above all, show our pride for having built a plant of these characteristics in Guadalajara’, concluded Carlos Manchado.
