Thermal oxidizer with gasifier

A pollution abatement apparatus, comprising:

• a thermal oxidizer for oxidizing polluted air, said thermal oxidizer having a polluted air inlet passing through a heat exchanger into a combustion chamber and a clean air outlet passing through said heat exchanger, said heat exchanger being heated in part by said combustion chamber and said combustion chamber being heated by a burner fueled by a fossil fuel;
• a gasifier for generating a synthetic gas from solid waste product produced from an industrial process, said gasifier having a solid feedstock inlet and a synthetic gas outlet;
• and
• said synthetic gas outlet being connected to said thermal oxidizer so as to provide synthetic gas to said thermal oxidizer and reduce the fossil fuel required to heat said combustion chamber to an oxidation temperature.

A method of reducing waste resulting from operating a manufacturing apparatus, comprising the steps of:

• operating a manufacturing apparatus thereby producing aerosol waste product and solid waste product;
• directing the aerosol waste product to a thermal oxidizer thereby reducing the aerosol waste product to carbon dioxide by introducing to said thermal oxidizer fossil fuel at a first energy rate;
• directing the solid waste product to a gasifier thereby converting the solid waste product to synthetic gas at a second energy rate having a lower BTU level than said fossil fuel;
• and
• routing the synthetic gas produced by said gasifier into said thermal oxidizer and balancing the flow rate of the synthetic gas with the flow of fossil fuel thereby reducing the flow rate of the fossil fuel and reducing the carbon dioxide vented from the thermal oxidizer resultant from the fossil fuel.