Thousands of tonnes of Bournemouth's waste will be sent to New Earth's MBT plant from next month following the results of  a LATS monitoring report.

The move comes after Dorset-based New Earth Solutions received confirmation earlier this month, that its MBT technology can divert over 80% of the biodegradable content of mixed waste from landfill.

Currently Bournemouth borough council sends 1,000 tonnes of black bin waste to processed in the MBT plant, while the rest of Bournemouth's residual waste is sent to landfill.

As a result of the LATS report, the five year contract has been extended so the council will begin send 5,000 tonnes of waste to New Earth's MBT plant by March next year and a percentage of the waste will be able to be used to count toward its Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme (LATS) targets.

Under the government-set LATS, Bournemouth must reduce its landfilling of biodegradable municipal waste (BMW) to 42,850 tonnes by 2010 and just 28,541 tonnes by 2013.

Critical results

Speaking to letsrecycle.com today, Roy Osborough, strategic waste manager at Bournemouth borough council said: "The LATS monitoring plan is incredibly significant to the council as it means that we have the ability to divert even more of the material we sent to New Earth's plant away from landfill. Also it means that the material which is diverted will have a lower biodegradability factor attached to it.

"The results will be particularly critical to us in future years as at the moment we are fairly comfortable and expect to hit the 2008 target with a LATS surplus. However when we get to the 2010 target year it will be a huge advantage to help us avoid LATS deficits," he said.

New Earth's MBT facility uses German and Austrian technology including enclosed windrow units and air handling and treatment systems.

The LATS monitoring report was undertaken by the Organics Resource Agency and took place at the MBT facility over 100 days, following the Environment Agency's recommended measure of stability, BM100.

Confirmation of the level of BMW diversion was determined by combining the results of the tests on Loss On Ignition (LOI) and the BM100 results.

Bankability

The trials have provided data which can be used to model the level of BMW diversion achievable by the New Earth technology when applied to waste of a known composition from any local authority.

Peter Mills, contracts director at New Earth Solutions said: "We are the first  biological treatment plant to obtain a LATS report for our plant. It is great as it proves the bankability of our technology to deliver landfill diversion it also enshrines the work we are doing as it is approved by the Environment Agency.

"The results will put in good stint for tenders and we plan to build on our five year contracts. We will also be in the position to help protect local authorities from LATS on short term procurement contracts."