The 350,000 tonnes per year capacity plant is seen as very significant for Biffa because it represents its first move into having a stake in large EfW infrastructure.
The facility, near Shepshed in Leicestershire, is the second in Encyclis’s planned portfolio of six EfW projects to be delivered on time following the start of commercial operations at Rookery South ERF, near Bedford, last year.
Encyclis managed the construction of Newhurst ERF, which it jointly owns with Biffa. The lead contractor was Hitachi Zosen Inova (HZI).
The majority of waste will be sourced via a £150 million contract between Biffa and Leicestershire county council, revealed by letsrecycle.com last year (see letsrecycle.com story).
Encyclis chief executive Owen Michaelson said: “The move into full commercial operations at Newhurst ERF is a credit to our teams, working with HZI to ensure completion as planned at the outset. Construction started in 2020, when we were all in the grip of the pandemic, and to have achieved delivery on time despite all those headwinds is the result of a remarkable effort by everyone involved in the project.”
The start of full operations at Newhurst ERF brings Encyclis’ installed capacity across the UK, Ireland and Italy to 1.8 million tonnes per annum.
Facility
Newhurst, which has a stack height of 96.5 metres, has a furnace with an air-cooled moving grate design. The moving grate will consist of inclined fixed and moving bars that move waste from the feed inlet to the residue discharge.
According to the Environment Agency permit for the facility, “the grate movement will turn and mix the waste along the surface of the grate, ensuring all waste will be exposed to the combustion process”.
Energy generated from the plant will be sold via Smartest Energy under a power purchase agreement. This has been described as “one of the largest power purchase agreements seen in the UK Energy-from-Waste sector”.
“Reaching this milestone at Newhurst… is vital in the delivery of our strategic investment plans
- Mick Davis, Biffa
‘Leading role’
Mick Davis, Biffa’s chief operating officer for resources & energy, said: “Biffa has a leading role to play in developing the recycling and Energy-from-Waste facilities that the UK needs if it is to become a low-carbon, resource-efficient economy.
“Energy recovery is a lower carbon alternative to landfill for the treatment of waste that can’t be reduced or recycled and will have a vital role to play for many years as a contributor to the transition to net zero.
“Reaching this milestone at Newhurst, along with our ambitious investments in recycling, are vital steps in the delivery of our strategic investment plans. We look forward to working with our partners to further reduce the UK’s reliance on landfill or export for managing the country’s non-recyclable waste.”
The facility achieved first fire on waste in October as part of the commissioning process and the completion of testing and optimisation enabled commercial takeover.
The project created more than 300 jobs during construction, with 50 people now employed by Encyclis at the facility to ensure 24/7 operations.
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