All Mechanical Recycler

I had previously wrote about a wind powered recycler installed on landfills. I want to clarify the all- mechanical separation process within the facility.

Vertical wind turbine shaft is directly attached to the grinder disk to maximize the power transfer and simplify the design. Air blower will be mounted below the grinder disk. As the grinder disk generate tiny particles from the landfill, they will be filtered out using the rotating filters. The filters determine the size of the particles escaping from the grinder. These disks will be periodically rotated to remove any clogging. The blower below the grinder will be used to cool the grinder and the warm air will be used to blow out the grinded particles. This process will speed up the drying of the particles. Turning waste into very fine particles increases their surface area considerably. Which helps the drying process as well.

The blown away fine particles will be sorted out by their density. Then ferrous particles will be separated using passive switchable magnets (like the ones used by welders). Finally, the remaining particles will be electrostatically separated. More stages can be added to the process that help sort out the particles. These stages should be all mechanical as well.

The objective of this system is to sort out the landfill using only mechanical systems with minimum electric and chemical requirements. Therefore, the facility wouldn't rely on external resources other than the wind. This is a much more sustainable and scalable approach to recycle the landfills.

Sorted out very fine particles would then be send to dedicated recycling facilities for further sorting and purification. Large surface area of the particles would reduce the cost of further processes.