General Waste Incinerators

A general waste incinerator is a dual-chamber unit specified for residual mixed waste: municipal and commercial refuse, hospitality waste, remote site and camp waste, and the non-recoverable fraction from construction. It handles the stream that recycling, composting and anaerobic digestion have already been given first refusal on. That sequence is not optional any more. Workplace and household separate-collection rules now require dry recyclables and food waste to be collected apart from residual waste, so the honest description of this stream is narrower than it was five years ago — and correspondingly harder for anyone to argue should have been recycled instead. What is left is genuinely mixed, contaminated and low-value. The combustion condition is the Industrial Emissions Directive one: 850°C to 1,200°C in the primary chamber, flue gas above 850°C for two seconds in the secondary, rising to 1,100°C where the waste carries more than 1% halogenated organic content. Mixed plastics in a residual bin are what occasionally take it there. The LitBurn LBI range covers 125, 250, 375 and 500 kg/h as continuous-duty units, front-loaded at floor level from the bins a site already uses. Six general waste streams are specified separately below because the case for a unit differs completely between them: a shopping centre is doing arithmetic on gate fees, an island depot has no round to rely on, and an airport handling international catering waste has a legal requirement to destroy it.

With an environmental permit, yes — and with the separate collection of dry recyclables and food waste done first, because that is now a legal requirement rather than good practice. What may be burned is the residual fraction that remains, with its waste codes named in the permit application.

When the round is long, unreliable or absent, or when the gate fee and Landfill Tax on the tonnage are large enough to carry the fuel, the operator time and the permit. Remote sites and islands are the clearest case because there is often no round at all; a city-centre retail park is an arithmetic question we are happy to do honestly.

No, and the distinction matters legally. Open burning of waste is generally unlawful for businesses and heavily restricted elsewhere. A permitted dual-chamber incinerator holds flue gas above 850°C for two seconds in a secondary chamber, which is the condition that destroys the organic fraction instead of dispersing it.

Size on hours and then check volume. Divide weekly residual arisings by the burn rate for the run time, then count containers against the chamber: uncompacted mixed waste fills a 3.3 m³ chamber long before it reaches 125 kg. Sites that skip the second check buy one size too small.

Batteries and vapes, gas canisters and aerosols, electrical items, tyres, asbestos, plasterboard and anything radioactive. Lithium cells are the practical one: they arrive in mixed waste constantly and they are the usual cause of fires in the sector, which is why removing them is a written step rather than an assumption.

3–5% of input mass for a typical residual charge, and more where the stream carries grit, glass or masonry — street sweepings and construction waste both sit above the range. Only that fraction still leaves the site, under a transfer note.

It should not. Food waste is separately collected and has treatment routes — anaerobic digestion and composting — that rank above disposal, and it is animal by-product material with its own rules. The exception is catering waste from international transport, which is Category 1 and must be destroyed under APHA-approved arrangements.

It is usually a better proposition on industrial waste than on residual mixed waste, which is wetter and more variable. At the LBI-375 and LBI-500 sizes it is still worth assessing for space or process heating, particularly on a remote site already burning fuel to make heat some other way.