In the 19th century, Hamburg's population grew rapidly and one problem escalated - waste disposal. A new era begins on January 1, 1896:Hamburg is the first city on the continent to put a waste incineration plant into operation.
by Oliver Diedrich, NDR.de
As early as 1892, the senate of the citizenry had submitted an application for the "construction of an incinerator for waste materials". But at that time the issue was first referred to a committee. Because initially many citizens are against simply burning rubbish and rubbish.
"Shards, cans, pieces of crinolines"
On the one hand, there are the farmers, who for centuries happily dumped the legacies of the townspeople on their fields as fertilizer. But this procedure became more and more problematic with the rapid industrialization in the last decades of the 19th century, as Hildegard Frilling and Olaf Mischer report in their book "Pütt un Pann'n", which sheds light on the history of waste disposal in Hamburg. Because the amounts of waste that are now piling up in Hamburg are so large that agriculture can hardly absorb them and landfills are needed for interim storage.
In addition, the waste from the city no longer contains such a large proportion of faeces since Hamburg received a sewage system in the mid-19th century. This means that the rubbish contains less material suitable as fertilizer, but more and more objects that "are only suitable for damaging the field. Shards, tins, pieces of hoop skirts, springs, broken combs and the like". Nevertheless, many farmers are against incineration and don't want to do without cheap fertilizer.
Problems with the first incinerators in England
Other opponents of the process cite problems in England:where industrialization began decades earlier than in Germany, waste has been incinerated in several cities since the 1870s. However, the systems are not mature at first and there is a lot of trouble from the stench, toxic exhaust gases and ash rain.
Cholera is forcing Hamburg to rethink
But in the 1890s, technology advanced and plants were built in England that were said to cause far fewer emissions. In Hamburg, on the other hand, a catastrophe occurs later in 1892 that makes it clear to the city fathers that they can no longer put off the issue of waste disposal:A cholera epidemic breaks out in the city. More than 16,000 Hamburg residents become infected within a few weeks, more than half of them die. The sometimes miserable hygienic conditions are obviously to blame for the rapid spread of cholera. The expert Robert Koch, who was sent to Hamburg by the Reich government, is said to have said after his visit to places like the Gängeviertel:"I forget that I'm in Europe."
MVA trial operation begins in 1894
Immediately after the end of the cholera epidemic, the Senate submitted a new application for the construction of a waste incineration plant (MVA). But surprisingly, the resistance is still great. Nine months later, the deputies agree. Then, however, the construction proceeds rapidly. In 1894 the first kilns are in place and the first firing tests can begin. In Hamburg, the waste is to be incinerated based on the model of the Horsfall ovens from England. By supplying warm air, these achieve higher combustion temperatures than the ovens previously used. This increases the effectiveness - and there is less smoke.
Start of operations in 1896:The energy generated is used to operate the system
The entire system costs around half a million Reichsmarks. On January 1, 1896, the new building on the Bullerdeich in the south-east of the city went into regular operation. The energy generated with the steam is used to operate the plant. For example for the lighting, the crane and the blower. The slag left over from incineration is used to build roads and is as hard as glass once it has cooled. Iron residues are separated from the slag using a magnet and sold. Another combustion product is fly ash. "However, it had advantages and disadvantages. Its insulating effect as filling material in ceiling or wall cavities was particularly appreciated. On the other hand, part of it got into the air through the chimney," says a commemorative publication by the Hamburg city cleaning department on the 100th anniversary of the commissioning. And further:
The cremation hall consisted of two levels. The so-called "tampers" worked on the upper, the furnace platform. They shoveled the rubbish into the dumping openings after the kiln workers on the lower level had removed the slag, a by-product of the amount of rubbish previously burned. A total of 36 furnace cells burned the household waste of around half a million inhabitants.Anja Nabasik, Adolf Nottrodt:100 years of waste incineration in Hamburg. Publisher:Stadtreinigung Hamburg. Hamburg, 1996.
"Here decontamination, there contamination!"
The environmental impact of the incinerator seems to have been quite large. The Hamburg garbage history "Pütt un Pann'n" quotes from an article in the magazine "Norddeutscher Gastwirt":
Hopefully they don't forget to remember the pestilence-like stench that the smoke from the institution spreads far and wide. So that when the direction of the wind blows the smoke toward their homes, residents are prevented from opening their windows. Here decontamination, there contamination! The falling smoke contains so many biting bits of ash that whole stretches of it are densely covered and the vegetables in the gardens become inedible. Hildegard Frilling, Olaf Mischer:Pütt und Pann'n. History of Hamburg household waste disposal. Hamburg, 1994.
45,000 tons of waste go through the chimney in the first year
In the first year, the incinerator incinerates around 45,000 tons of waste - by 1914 the amount has almost doubled. But Hamburg still has to keep dumping its waste. This happens on a large scale:Waste is used to drain swamp areas or to fill in exploited clay pits, as in Lokstedt, Fuhlsbüttel and Groß Borstel.
Just a few days after the start of regular operation of the waste incineration plant, however, it became apparent that the planned two-shift system is not sufficient for the workers, as not all of the waste delivered can be incinerated. A third layer is introduced. The workers "are not allowed to leave the post during working hours, but can have refreshments on the spot," wrote an engineer at the time.
Thousands of tons of waste are collected by the garbage disposal employees in Hamburg every year. Other systems are added
The plant on the Bullerdeich mainly incinerates the waste from the eastern parts of the city. The garbage from the north of Hamburg is still dumped on leased sites outside the city - and there are many complaints about rubbish lying around. In 1907 the citizenry approved the construction of a second incinerator. It is built on Alter Teichweg in Barmbek and officially put into operation in 1912. The ovens there are no longer filled by hand, as on the Bullerdeich, but with the help of a hydraulic device. In the decades that followed, further facilities were added - for example in the Ruhrstraße in Altona and in the Borsigstraße. Some of the old facilities are being demolished and rebuilt, and some locations are also being abandoned.
Today 15 times more garbage is burned than in 1896
The most recent balance sheet shows that the two current plants on Borsigstraße and Rugenberger Damm in 2019 "thermally recycled" - i.e. burned - a total of around 680,000 tons of waste. Most of the energy released goes into Hamburg's district heating network. The numbers are not directly comparable, because garbage from the surrounding area is now also coming to the Hamburg incinerator. But the amount of waste that ends up in the furnaces today is 15 times greater than it was in 1896, when the first incinerator started operating. The population has only tripled since then.