TANA mobile waste shredder gives Agon Pacific a foothold in Thailand's growing Waste-to-Energy market
Thailand is responding to the growing demand for electricity with a network of small Waste-to-Energy (W2E) plants. Agon Pacific’s TANA 440DT mobile waste shredder produces fuel for one of these W2E plants from factory-rejected car tires that are unfit for road use.
In Prachinburi, Thailand, a yellow TANA 440DT mobile shredder swallows rejected tyres and spits out small chunks of rubber. At the same time, the machine separates the steel used for reinforcing the tyres.
“The benefit of the TANA is that it does not only cut tyres but shreds them, allowing any metal to be separated from the rubber and nylon to be incinerated. The separated metal is so pure that our customers can sell it directly onwards as a recycled material,” says Tommi Ijäs.
Ijäs is the co-founder and CEO of Agon Pacific, which was founded in 2011. Based in Bangkok, Agon Pacific’s main lines of business include manufacturing boiler pressure parts and boiler maintenance service.
“Rather than building new boilers, our job is to make existing power plants operate longer and with better efficiency,” Ijäs says.
In recent years, the company has expanded its operations in Thailand to the booming W2E or Waste-to-Energy business. Since 2019, Agon Pacific has been providing fuel to Green Power Energy Co., Ltd., which generates electricity from shredded tyres.
“Approximately 2 to 3 percent of new tyres do not meet the quality requirements. Our customer's boiler requires small pieces measuring about 50 by 50 millimetres, which our TANA waste shredder is easily capable of producing from tyres.”
Growing population creating demand for waste incineration
Ijäs knows Thailand and its society well. He moved there from Finland as far back as 1997. As in many other countries, the circular economy and the reuse of various types of waste are a topical issue in Thailand.
“There is effective waste management in Thailand’s cities, although drivers of garbage trucks still spend a lot of their working time sorting garbage. There is no waste management in the countryside, where a large part of the rubbish is collected in barrels and then incinerated at regular intervals,” Ijäs describes.
For Agon Pacific, the evolving energy and waste management sector means new business. In a country with a growing population, there is a need for services that make the circular economy more efficient. In its Waste-to-Energy service model, Agon Pacific uses a TANA 440DT to produce tyre shred that is suitable for incineration on behalf of the customer.
“Much of Thailand’s electricity is based on gas imported from Myanmar, but Myanmar increasingly needs the gas itself. We want to create solutions for the Waste-to-Energy business, for which there is a clear need both in Thailand and elsewhere in Southeast Asia.”
As the population continues to grow in Thailand and also elsewhere in Southeast Asia, more electricity needs to be produced and also in a more environmentally friendly way. For this reason, Thailand is investing heavily in Waste-to-Energy production. The country’s vision is a decentralised electricity generation system, with the construction of about a hundred small waste-fired power plants in 76 provinces throughout Thailand.