Waste management company, Shanks Group plc, has announced that it has commenced building work on its new waste treatment facility in Wakefield.

Shanks, construction partners Kier, and Wakefield Council marked the occasion with a ‘breaking ground’ ceremony to signify commencement of construction of the facility that is hoped ‘to revolutionise waste management in the Wakefield District’.

The waste treatment facility at Holmsley Lane in South Kirkby, Wakefield, forms part of a 25 year PFI contract with Wakefield Council.

Mix of technologies

According to Shanks, the facility will have the capacity to process up to 230,000 tonnes of municipal waste per annum, increasing the council’s landfill diversion rate ‘towards 90 per cent’.

Municipal waste from Wakefield Council will undergo mechanical treatment and sorting in order to separate off materials that can be used to produce a ‘refuse derived fuel’ for consumption at the Ferry Bridge Power Station.

Any mixed recyclate material separated at the facility will pass through an on-site materials recovery facility (MRF) for use by ‘specialist markets’.

Organic waste will then be sterilised in a ‘state-of-the-art’ autoclave, before being fed into a 65,000 tonne anaerobic digestion (AD) plant. The resultant biogas will be used to power the plant, with any remaining electricity being fed back onto the national grid. The ‘nutrient rich’ residue from the AD process will be used to condition soil.

Furthermore, green waste will be broken down in an ‘air controlled composting plant’, the compost from which will be used by residents and ‘land remediation schemes’ across Wakefield District, as well as further afield.

It is hoped the contract will see recycling and composting rates increase to 52 per cent, meaning that if the 90 per cent diversion figure is reached, around 40 per cent of Wakefield's waste would be sent for energy recovery.

‘Facility will transform waste management in Wakefield ‘

Speaking at the ceremony, Peter Eglinton, Managing Director of Shanks UK, said: “We are delighted to mark this significant milestone in the project and look forward to continuing the construction through to completion, where the facility will transform waste management in Wakefield.”

According to Shanks, the construction of the residual waste treatment facility is set to create in the region of 250 construction jobs, in addition to 60 permanent positions once the facility has been completed.

Leader of Wakefield Council, Councillor Peter Box, added: “The new waste treatment facility will not only reduce the amount of waste sent to landfill, but 60 new jobs will be created when the facility is fully operational. This will make a significant contribution to the local economy and is great news environmentally for the district.”

Overcapacity

The new facility is one of a growing number of energy-from-waste plants being approved and built in the UK, despite a recent report from Eunomia Research & Consulting suggesting that the UK could see overcapacity in residual waste treatment plants by 2015, if the current rate of construction is not curbed.

The report suggests that due to increased emphasis on recycling, reusing and recovering material, residual waste rates are falling, leaving incinerators without the required levels of waste needed to produce efficient and cost-effective processes.

It is feared that this would lead to more recyclable materials being sent for incineration to “feed” the plants.

Read more about waste and recycling in Wakefield District.