And, Viridor has also stated it is ‘relentless in its pursuit of quality’, after the report suggested its Milton Keynes facility rejected 20.51% of material during the same year.
The comments followed Monksleigh’s ‘Review of Material Recovery Facility Performance’, which examines both Environment Agency data and figures submitted by local authorities via WasteDataFlow (WDF) to determine how large MRFs in England are performing.
The consultancy firm’s report initially aimed to show the levels of dry mixed recyclables received against the amount rejected as non-target materials at 18 facilities handling 50,000 tonnes per year or over in the 2013 calendar year.
The study was then narrowed down to 12 facilities after several were found to be conducting other activities such as waste transfer operations or RDF production – which would have skewed the reject figures.
Focusing on the 12 MRFs, the study found that there was a ‘discrepancy’ between the Environment Agency and WDF data, as well as variations for reject rates for different local authorities entering the same MRF.
Monksleigh claims that there was an average tonnage reject rate when using EA data of 16.7% – compared to 7.81% when using WasteDataFlow figures.
‘High’
The Agency data revealed reject rates varying between 8%-27% across the 12 MRFs – but added that some sites had reported third party tonnages that were not from councils, resulting in ‘extremely high’ reject rates.
The report concluded: “Correlation between the EA data and WDF data is, in the most part, reasonably strong but the reject levels for some local authorities seem to be reported as extremely low based upon both Monksleigh’s experience in the sector.
“The report has made some suggestions as to why this might be, but without further contact with MRF operators and/or local authorities that are completing returns the exact reasons remain speculative.”
It adds that councils would be ‘well advised’ to consider whether their recycling practices are ‘technically, environmentally and economically practicable’ (TEEP) and should their reporting with operators to ensure reject levels are being correctly recorded.
Veolia
However, Veolia has argued its three sites featured in the analysis at Alton, Rainham and Gillmoss should have been excluded from the analysis – stating that reject rates are ‘much lower’ than stated.
Using Environment Agency data, the report showed Alton in Hampshire to have reported a 27.43% reject rate in 2013, with Rainham and Gillmoss also said to have recorded 14.69% and 16.34% respectively.
In a letter to a CIWM publication, which ran an article on the Monksleigh report, Veolia’s technical director Richard Kirkman stated: “In fact, contrary to the article, two of these sites do have transfer stations attached (Alton and Rainham) and therefore should have been excluded from further analysis – not least because transfer tonnages have been included in the EA returns. The residue rates are more in line with the UK average which is primarily a function of input contamination by non-recyclable material rather than MRF performance.”
Viridor
Also commenting on the data, Viridor’s director of strategy Chris Jonas said that regulators and clients’ reporting requirements ‘differ on occasions’.
The report included four MRFs belonging to the waste company: Ford in West Sussex, Crayford in Kent, Masons in Suffolk and its Milton Keynes-based facility.
According to the Environment Agency data published in the report, the Milton Keynes MRF recorded a reject rate of 20.51% in 2013 – compared to a WDF figure of just 6.79%.
Mr Jonas said: “Viridor has a relentless pursuit of quality from our recycling operations aimed to service needs of both our local authority clients and offtake reprocessors. We report all metrics to the relevant regulators and clients in accordance with their requirements which differ on occasions.”
Responding to feedback from the companies, Andrew Olie, managing director of Monksleigh, said: “The article [in CIWM] tried to make a clear delineation between the figures being reported under the EA returns and the figures being reported under the WasteDataFlow returns, indeed if the Veolia figures are considered in their table Veolia’s reject rates are close to those reported under WasteDataFlow in the table in the article. What this confirms is the article’s assertion that the EA returns in some cases record more than just contamination in mixed recyclables – with the full report giving a number of reasons why this may be the case. Veolia are indeed confirming that they seem to be using their MRFs as wider processing facilities and not just DMR MRFs.
“The report was also careful to not link the reject level to the quality of the material produced – a good MRF could be producing a high quality product from a highly contaminated input, but the ability to do so is not easy and we would agree with Veolia that it would be better not to process highly contaminated material at the risk of affecting overall output quality.”
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