This project is co-financed with state support from the Czech Technology Agency and the Ministry of the Environment of the Czech Republic within the Environment for Life programme. This project has been funded by the European Recovery and Resilience Facility within the framework of the National Recovery Plan.
Solution period: 04/2024 - 06/2026
Principal Investigator: Research Institute of Building Materials, a.s.
Project partner: LB Cemix, s.r.o.
Project introduction and objectives
The essence of the proposed project is the reprocessing of hazardous waste into a safe recoverable product. Hazardous waste is asbestos-cement products stored in hazardous waste landfills or currently removed from buildings and packed in sealed packages in accordance with Decree No. 294/2005 Coll. The degradation of the contained asbestos fibres bonded to the cement matrix is carried out thermally at high temperatures above 1100 °C in a shaft kiln for lime production. The kiln will be loaded alternately with the crushed limestone in separate loading bins in original safety packaging to prevent air contamination with asbestos fibres. The packaging will then contribute to the heat balance of the kiln by burning. Asbestos-cement products have a very favourable chemical composition as they contain unhydrated cement and sand in addition to asbestos and can therefore be fired to produce a hydraulic binder with a high belite content. Much of the calcium contained is in non-carbonate form, so firing it instead of limestone also reduces CO2 emissions. The material remains at a high temperature in the shaft kiln for at least 8 hours, which is believed to be long enough for the necessary reactions to take place. After firing, the material is ground and used in dry mortar mixes or as hydraulic lime, depending on the properties found. The properties and type of hydraulic lime can be adjusted by varying the addition of quicklime.
The main objective of the project is the reuse of hazardous waste, asbestos cement products, their safe degradation and conversion into a usable hydraulic binder. The project will include laboratory confirmation of the thermal degradation of asbestos in asbestos cement products, verification of the usability of the resulting raw material in dry mortar and plaster mixtures, and design and verification of the processing technology on an industrial scale under lime shaft kiln conditions. The implementation of the project will have a significant societal impact on the elimination of hazardous waste containing asbestos, which is a widespread material in both existing buildings and landfills and poses a significant potential health risk to present and future generations.
Project results
SS07020041 - V1 Dry mortar mix containing a non-hazardous hazardous waste product (Gfunk)
SS07020041 - V2 Hydraulic lime from hazardous waste (Fužit)
SS07020041 - V3 Asbestos cement waste treatment and recycling technology (Ztech)
