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Tackling waste in Leicestershire
Posted on 17/09/2008
Multi-million pound plans to reduce the amount of Leicestershire waste that goes to landfill took a step forward yesterday.
The County Council wants to develop a waste treatment facility or facilities, for up to 180,000 tonnes of waste per year.
The County Council has stressed, however, that no decision has been taken on the technology which will be used to treat the waste. A variety of technologies will be considered including:
- autoclave systems
- energy from waste
- gasification
- mechanical biological treatment
- pyrolysis
The Government’s environment department, DEFRA, advised the County Council to make different sites available for the treatment facilities to give potential bidders a choice.
The County Council has bought plots five and six at the Interlink business park in Bardon, north west Leicestershire, to give private companies a choice of potential sites for a waste treatment facility.
Companies can now propose options and technologies for the Bardon site, the County Council’s existing Whetstone site, or any sites they propose themselves.
Nick Rushton, Cabinet spokesman for waste, said: “We cannot afford to do nothing if we continue to put thousands of tonnes of waste into landfill sites, we will run out of space and have to pay millions of pounds in penalties.
“We are one of the top performing councils for recycling but there will always be waste leftover which we cannot keep sending to landfill.
“We want to find the best process to treat waste and reduce the amount that is landfilled but have made no decision on technology.
“We now have two sites to give potential operators a choice but they are also free to suggest their own site.”
At the moment, 230,000 tonnes of Leicestershire’s household waste is dumped at landfill sites each year. Each tonne of waste incurs landfill tax from the Government and this bill could increase by £1.4 million per year if landfilling continues at the current rate.
The County Council is working to minimise waste and to boost recycling and composting to 58 per cent but this will still leave some waste that will have to be treated or landfilled.
Notes
- Autoclave systems = autoclaving involves the steam processing of waste within a vessel under pressure
- Energy from waste = conventional thermal treatment of waste involving the combustion of household waste with the outputs used to produce energy.
- Gasification = thermal treatment in the partial presence of oxygen
- Mechanical biological treatment = involves using mechanical processes to segregate waste and biological processes to decompose the organic materials
- Pyrolysis = thermal treatment in absence of oxygen (like making charcoal)