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Energy recovery efforts enhanced in Staffordshire

Philip Atkins, Staffordshire County Council leader, talks to PSE’s David Stevenson about the opportunities that a new energy recovery facility will bring to the region.

Staffordshire County Council says a new state-of-the-art energy recovery facility will save the region’s taxpayers about £250m over the next 25 years, while allowing the local authority to hit its 70% recycling rate target.

The Four Ashes W2R facility, which has been developed by Veolia in partnership with CNIM Clugston Staffordshire Ltd, is helping Staffordshire County Council to reach its target of ‘Zero Waste to Landfill’ by using a range of innovative technologies.

The new scheme was based partly on the success of a recycling facility on the Isle of Man. The local authority looked at how that design and concept worked. Cllr Philip Atkins, leader of Staffordshire County Council, told PSE: “All the waste goes into an incinerator at the Isle of Man facility, which provides electricity to the island.

“But one of the key differences between our two projects is that their ash goes out of the site and a small amount ends up in landfill. The ash that comes out of the Staffordshire plant is recaptured, has all the metals removed from it, and is incorporated into construction aggregate and either goes into road or building projects.”

Eco-electricity

Opened in May by HRH the Duke of Gloucester, the plant is a partnership project for Staffordshire County Council and its partners: Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council, Walsall Metropolitan Borough Council and Warwickshire County Council.

Each year it is expected that the site will divert 300,000 tonnes of local waste from landfill, which will generate enough electricity to power 35,000 homes.

Cllr Atkins added: “The Four Ashes W2R site provides us with a leading facility which delivers huge savings, renewable energy, jobs and an educational offer.

“When we started the project 10 years ago, we had a long, hard look at future issues that we could see coming up around the landfill tax, encouraging recycling and how we could meet the very stretching targets government was setting us.

“We had looked at combined heat and power plants for every town in the county, but we realised that having one planning application and one site in the south of the county was the way forward.”

Staffordshire will be supplying about half the waste to the facility but does not have a de minimis threshold. And, at present, additional municipal waste is coming from other authorities including Warwickshire, Sandwell, Walsall, Wolverhampton and Shropshire.

The Four Ashes W2R facility is also a 25-year PFI contract, which is the biggest in Staffordshire County Council’s history, and is set to deliver tax savings to the residents of Staffordshire of about £10m a year to a total of over £250m.

“Taking all this into context, the facility will help us immeasurably in hitting our recycling targets, dealing with the waste that goes in the ground and also the commercial waste. On top of this, it is delivering electricity to the grid – enough to power about 30,000 homes,” said Cllr Atkins. “We are also now looking at capturing some of the waste heat from the site and putting it into other uses with the Ministry of Justice helping heat a nearby prison, and with South Staffordshire College we are helping them with some work on greenhouses and horticulture.”

Site development

PSE was told that a key to the success of the project and the concept was buying the Four Ashes site, close enough to the local highways. Atkins stated that having got planning permission it was able to tender to firms by saying: “Here’s the money and the land, what facility can you build? We had a lot of interest.”

Getting PFI credits from the government was also important. “If we didn’t have them the plan would still have been viable,” added Atkins, “but the site would have had to have been bigger for a larger throughput of waste and to produce more electricity.”

After the contract was finally awarded to Veolia, the council worked closely with the company to explain to local residents what
was going on. And, during the project development, there were regular meetings with a community liaison group to ensure that people in the local area had the opportunity to find out more about the facility and receive regular community updates.

On top of keeping the community informed, 85% of the construction workforce developing the facility came from Staffordshire, while 95% of the equipment used was procured from the county.

Estelle Brachlianoff, Veolia executive vice president for UK and Ireland, said: “The development of the new plant is all part of the ‘Zero Waste to Landfill’ strategy, which is tackling head-on the growing problem of domestic waste.

“We are dedicated to maximising recycling first, and then recovering energy from the leftover residual waste.

“New infrastructure like this, which utilises the latest technologies, is vital if the UK is to meet landfill diversion targets and reduce carbon emissions. It can also bring significant economic benefits and by working closely with Staffordshire County Council we are helping stimulate economic growth and improve environmental performance.”

However, Cllr Atkins was slightly disappointed that the facility’s technology couldn’t be sourced locally. “The technology is German. Sadly, we don’t seem to make this technology in the UK – the actual burners and boilers themselves,” he said.

Although he was happy the progress the facility is making. “The last I heard the facility was meant to be coping with about 5,000 tonnes of waste per week, but it is now coping with 6,000 tonnes per week. So, the facility came in on time and is putting a little more extra in than we thought, probably from commercial waste, and it is also saving us more money,” added Atkins.

Next generation opportunities

In addition to generating large energy savings, the facility incorporates an education centre that will be open to schools from Staffordshire and the surrounding areas – helping young people understand why it is important to recycle and that energy is a finite resource.

Veolia has also donated £6,000 to local schools for environmental projects. Staff from the company have volunteered in the community and worked with Keele University to produce a teaching resource on recycling.

Atkins said: “There are so many educational benefits from the project. It is a real opportunity for young people to come along and see the plant in action.

“Fours Ashes also provides us with an innovative way to produce heating and electricity across the region. And I can recommend to anyone that is concerned with waste disposal issues, that this is a good scheme and a good way ahead to deal with future issues.”

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