Autoclave specialist and waste treatment and renewable power company, Sterecycle, has announced it has gone into administration. With effect from last week (19 September), three subsidiaries: Sterecycle Management Services Limited;
Sterecycle Holdings Limited; and Sterecycle (Rotherham) Limited, that employs around 50 people, have gone up for sale.

The announcement follows a difficult year for the organisation, which has cited a ‘significant downturn in trading results’ arising from the decline in the value of recyclates, and its failure to list on the Toronto Venture Exchange as the decisive factors in calling in administrators Guy Hollander and Mike Wellard of Mazars LLP. They will manage the company while a buyer is sought.

Sterecycle uses large autoclaves to apply steam and pressure to sterilise residual waste, separating off materials for recycling and transforming the organic portion of the waste to produce power through anaerobic digestion (AD) or combined heat and power (CHP) plants.

The company says its Rotherham facility - opened in 2008 - was the world’s first to use this technology on a commercial scale. Plans had been made to extend the plant’s capacity to treat 175,000 tonnes per annum, but just a year after securing funding the facility was closed for several months following a large explosion. The incident, though to have been caused by a drop in pressure from the failure of a pressure valve, claimed the life of one employee and seriously injured another.

Speaking on the company’s decision, Sterecycle’s CEO, Tom Shields, said: “It is with great sadness that the Board has... reluctantly decided to call in an administrator having explored all practical options to continue trading with the company in its present form. I would thank all those who have supported the company through this difficult time.”