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lnternational visit to the mine and the
waste warehouse at Heilbronn (Germany)
The Delegation of the City of Vienna, MA 48 and
.A.S.A. in front of BigBags in the waste storage
Heilbronn f.l.t.r. Dr. Laub (.A.S.A. AG), DI Thon
(MA 48), Dr. Dörfel (SWS AG), DI Siebenhandl
(MA 48), Mrs. Novak (.A.S.A. AG).
Handling of packed residues underground.
DI Siebenhandl (MA 48) informs himself about
exact storage location.
Approximately 1.2 million MWh of heat and
81,000 MWh of electricity are produced by
the four Viennese waste incineration plants
annually. The flue gases are specially filtered
and cleaned. For 20 years the local waste
management company .A.S.A. Abfall Ser-
vice AG has been taking care of the incu-
rring flue gas residues for the Municipal De-
partment MA 48 in Vienna. These have since
been safely and retrievably stored in the salt
mine Heilbronn (Germany). A delegation led
by the Directors of the Viennese MA 48 con-
vinced themselves of the high quality and
safety of underground disposal during the
visit.
“Responsible management of the residual
materials is one of the main pillars of our
environmental policy,” said Josef Thon, Di-
rector of MA 48 on the occasion of the visit
in Heilbronn. “We closely cooperate with es-
tablished partners such as .A.S.A. to ensure
maximum safety in waste disposal. .A.S.A. is
working to our fullest satisfaction”.
Complete isolation
from the biosphere
The City of Vienna and .A.S.A. have been
working together since 1992: Since then,
about 160,000 tons of flue gas cleaning resi-
dues (filter cake and fly ashes) of the Vienne-
se incinerators have been deposited retrie-
vably in the underground mines of SWS AG
in Heilbronn. “Thus, by increasing scarcity of
resources it is possible to use the deposi-
ted materials as a source of raw materials
Senior representatives of MA 48
fulfilled their supervision work and
went down to the mine and the
waste warehouse at Heilbronn.
For the past 20 years, MA 48 and
.A.S.A. have been collaborating in
handling waste from
the incinerators of the Austrian
capital.
Transport by rail
and recover contained non-ferrous metals in
the future.” so Dr. Bertram Laub of .A.S.A..
“Today’s waste is our resource of tomorrow.”
Laub states further.
Until then, the waste materials are stored
with complete and permanent isolation from
the biosphere in the salt mine. Due to the
absolute dryness and impermeability inside
the salt rock, the deposition in the digging
chambers of Heilbronn grants highest secu-
rity.
Representatives of the Municipal MA 48
Department of Vienna hosted the event
u s i n e s s
The residues are transported environmentally friendly by rail to its interim and final sto-
rage. .A.S.A. and SWS AG pay particular attention to the complete documentation of
the entire disposal process: origin, transportation, packing, packaging and deposition
are accurately recorded and material flows are documented seamlessly through to the
exact storage location in the chambers of the mine. Also the fly ashes from the .A.S.A.
own incinerator in Zistersdorf are transported by train to SWS AG and deposited there
for future exploitation.
.A.S.A. Group based in Himberg near Vienna is the largest waste management com-
pany in CEE with more than 4.500 employees. It serves more than 4.7 million inhabi-
tants and disposes of around 4 million tons of waste from commercial and industrial
clients annually. In the active salt pit of the Südwestdeutsche Salzwerke AG (SWS AG)
about 4 million tons of rock salt is extracted annually. The void volume of the mine
is currently around 55 million m
3
, further 2 million m
3
are mined yearly in the salt pit.
The digging chambers are connected by a 750 km long underground street and road
network