Artist's impression of the MBT and EfW facility at Boghill Road, Mallusk, in Northern Ireland.

The Becon Consortium, the last remaining bidder for Northern Ireland’s arc21 residual waste procurement contract, has today (12 March) announced that it will build a £240-million mechanical biological treatment (MBT) facility and energy-from-waste (EfW) plant at the existing Hightown Quarry on the Boghill Road, near Mallusk, as part of its proposals for treating the area’s residual waste.

The consortium, owned by E.ON Energy from Waste (currently being sold to a joint venture comprising the EQT Fund and E.ON SE) has now opened up a 12-week public consultation on its proposals for treating the residual waste from the 11 councils in the partnership.

According to Becon, the consultation is designed to ‘explain the proposals in detail, answer questions and provide the public and other stakeholders with an opportunity to provide their feedback ahead of submission of a formal planning application in September’.

If approved, the plans could mark the first time incineration and MBT technologies have been used in Northern Ireland to treat residual waste. The project is subject to the successful conclusion of both public procurement and planning processes.

More than 500,000-tonne combined capacity

Representing a capital investment of £240 million, the plans could see Becon Consortium deliver an MBT facility with a capacity to treat 300,000 tonnes of waste per year (though Becon says it expects the plant to actually deal with around 245,000 tonnes) and an incinerator that can accept and treat approximately 211,000 tonnes of non-recyclable waste per annum.

In 2011/12, arc21 collected 517,972 tonnes of municipal waste, and landfilled 60.9 per cent of it, or 315,445 tonnes. Since 2002, arc21 has seen its household waste arisings decrease by 11.1 per cent. Even if the downward trend does not continue, should the councils in arc21 achieve Northern Ireland’s target of 50 per cent recycling by 2020, that would leave less than 260,000 tonnes in need of treatment.

Becon expects that the facilities will increase arc21’s recycling levels (which stood at 37.7 per cent) by 10 per cent and export 14 megawatts of electricity to the National Grid, enough to power more than 30,000 homes.

According to an independent economic assessment by Oxford Economics, the project will ‘create or sustain’ 337 permanent ‘direct and indirect’ jobs when operational – and up to 455 direct construction jobs as well as supporting a ‘significant number’ of additional jobs in the construction supply chain.

The project will also include a visitor centre to showcase the facilities’ technologies.

Arc21 comprises Antrim Borough Council, Ards Borough Council, Ballymena Borough Council, Belfast City Council, Carrickfergus Borough Council, Castlereagh Borough Council, Down District Council, Larne Borough Council, Lisburn City Council, Newtownabbey Borough Council and North Down Borough Council. It encompasses over half the population of Northern Ireland and accounts for over half of its municipal waste. The procurement process was opened to help arc21 fulfil its EU landfill reduction targets.

Proposals mark first time incineration and MBT used in NI

Describing the project, Ian Smith, Project Director at Becon Consortium said: “This is a very exciting project which will see Northern Ireland catch up with the rest of Europe in ensuring we view waste as a valuable resource. Not only will it address the European imperative to divert our waste from landfill, but this project will ensure we extract the maximum value from the remaining non-recyclable black bin waste to generate much needed renewable and sustainable energy.

“We believe we are proposing the best available technology solution in the most suitable location to manage arc21’s waste in a more environmentally responsible and sustainable way. In doing so, we will maximise the value from waste using proven technology and processes that will be regulated by the Northern Ireland Environment Agency in compliance with strict EU permits.”

As the proposals mark the first time that either incineration or MBT have been used to treat residual waste in Northern Ireland, Smith added that he expected “a number of questions and issues to be raised” at the consultation, but was “confident” that Brecon could explain the proposals and “the many benefits they bring”.

Potential council opposition

However, environmentalists, including Friends of the Earth have warned that incineration is "not the right way to deal with our waste".

Declan Allison, Friends of the Earth campaigner for Northern Ireland said: "We need to reduce the amount of waste we produce, and recycle what can be recycled. That means we need to eliminate unnecessary packaging, for example, and collect more recyclable materials from people’s doorsteps. Ironically, the waste that is best for generating power is also the waste that is easiest to recycle or compost – paper, plastics, and food scraps. So this incinerator could be competing with recycling and composting facilities.

“In addition, this site is not a good location. For energy from waste to be most efficient, the hot water generated during the incineration should be used. This site is too far from heavy users of heat and hot water, such as homes and offices, to make it efficient.”

Allison added that incineration cannot be made green "just by calling it energy-from-waste" and said that Friends of the Earth supports alternative EfW technologies, such as anaerobic digestion for food and garden waste.

Furhter, several councils within arc21, including Belfast City Council have previously voted against including incineration in their waste management plans, with Belfast rejecting plans for a waste incinerator to built on the North Foreshore in 2009.

Despite this, Ricky Burnett, Policy and Operations Director, at arc21 said that the proposals “satisfied [arc21’s] requirements”.

He explained: “The need to ensure we meet targets and avoid potentially heavy fines has been well documented. It is important to build on the good progress we have made over the last decade in utilising waste as a resource. We must continue to strive towards improving our recycling rates and minimising the amount of material sent to landfill.

“Providing infrastructure to treat residual waste within our area represents the preferred option to meeting the challenges ahead. The proposals from the Becon Consortium, being unveiled today, are in response to our ongoing procurement to provide this infrastructure. They contain a mix of technologies and facilities which satisfies our requirements and is at a site which is well located for a development of this nature. It will significantly reduce our dependency on landfill and contribute to improving the security and diversity of energy production in Northern Ireland.

“The consultation offers an opportunity for the public to engage through a variety of means and people are encouraged to offer comments to Becon on the proposals.”

As part of the consultation, brochures outlining the plans for the project will be distributed to approximately 30,000 homes and businesses in the vicinity of the site and a number of planned community drop-in sessions will be held within Newtownabbey, Antrim and Belfast City Council areas. Further information can also be found on Becon’s website.

It is anticipated that the plants will be constructed and in full operation within four years of securing planning and permitting consents.

Overcapacity

Throughout Europe, EfW remains a contentious issue, with opponents claiming facilities often greatly overestimate the amount of material available to be incinerated, leading to overcapacity. Indeed, GAIA (the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives), has warned that the EU’s increasing incineration capacity could damage recycling rates, while Eunomia released a report in 2012 that warned that without any change in residual waste quantities, by 2015/16, there would be treatment ‘overcapacity of 6.9 million tonnes per annum’.

Indeed, last month, Defra withdrew £217.1 million in PFI funding from three proposed EfW plants in England, after finding that the 29 residual waste treatment projects that already have funding are ‘sufficient’ to meet the EU’s 2020 landfill diversion targets.

Read more about Becon Consortium’s proposals.