Waste and pollution

All human activity pollutes and generates waste. The energy sector is no exception to this rule. When considering the waste or discharges from an activity, there are three points to bear in mind (figure 1 ):

• waste from one activity can be a raw material for other activities. For example, cheese whey can be used to produce biogas through methanization;

• when considering the toxicity of a waste or discharge, it's the dose that makes the poison. Very small quantities may not be toxic for living beings, but their total elimination can lead to considerable costs;

• detection methods are becoming increasingly precise. For a given toxicant, we must not align the toxicity threshold with...