Waste Management in the Palm Oil Industry

This chapter provides an overview of oil palm industry and its associated impact. Since the industry is dominated by Southeast Asian countries, steps to address environmental impact in countries such as Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand and importance of dealing with wastes generated from the industry were elaborated here.

In Malaysia, palm oil industry is an irreplaceable economic activity due to its high global demand in both food and non-food industries. Thus, large land areas have been used for oil palm plantation in this country. However, oil palm plantation is also generating large amount of raw biomass. The major oil palm biomass produced in the oil palm plantation includes oil palm fronds and oil palm trunk. One hectare of oil palm planted area produces approximately 10 tonnes of oil palm fronds and 75 tonnes of oil palm trunk. In fact, huge amount of solid oil palm biomass is found on the plantations and the rest is generated in the mills during the production of crude palm oil. Even though both oil palm plantation solid wastes have been occupying the majority among the oil palm biomass, the fronds are merely utilized as mulch, while the trunks are normally left to burn or decay in the plantation area. Such underutilization of oil palm plantation wastes is encouraging the researchers to find ways to valorize the solid wastes into different bio-based products. Thus, this review highlights the potential reuse of oil palm fronds and oil palm trunk as the lignocellulosic biomass in producing bioenergy, bio-based chemicals, biochar, fertilizer, animal feed and other bio-based products.

This chapter focuses on the wastes that are generated specifically from palm oil milling activities. We will first introduce the palm oil milling processes and also identify processes which generate wastes. Subsequently, we will look into how wastes from palm oil milling are currently managed, any governing laws and limitations to how these wastes could be handled. Finally, a comprehensive overview on technological advancements on palm oil mill wastes and future directions of palm oil mill waste management will be discussed here.

In the previous chapter, we identified various technologies that can be implemented for POME treatment. Meanwhile, this chapter covers a case study focused specifically on the use of high-rate anaerobic digester for POME treatment and improvements to the process with the aim to produce stable effluent and biogas production from anaerobic digestion with specific focus on process control and pre-treatment of POME.

Merits for a circular economy framework program that process/convert all organic wastes from palm oil mill into specific blends of Bio-Organic Fertilizers (“BOF”) and re-deployed back to the surrounding communities/plantations as long term soil remediation’s endeavors. This kind of circular economic program represents a very significant improvement in the reduction of pollutants from the usual waste treatment processes and has inherent economic values (besides environmental values) that compel the stake holders to adopt and maintain. Application of appropriate bio-organic fertilizers as integral supplements in addition to chemical fertilizers (in reduced amount), would form the basis of a sustainable plantation management practice that promotes better plant health, higher fruits yield and prolong productive lifespan of the biological assets. Principals of a circular economy framework that embrace an economically efficient investment model for long-term value creation, address various environmental, social, and governance issues within specific targeted industries’ supply chains, should be considered by any potential Public Private Partnership initiative towards sustainability intensifications.