The technology will enable Keenan to process the kitchen waste in line with the Animal By Product Regulations which lay down strict controls for the treatment of meat and dairy-inclusive waste – and will make New Deer the largest VCU site in Europe.
At present, Keenan processes around 60,000 tonnes of green waste from six councils, at various sites in Scotland. Around 30,000 tonnes is processed at the New Deer site including Aberdeen's which is taken there via the city's waste disposal contractor SITA UK. The new technology will provide an extra 20,000 tonnes of capacity to process kitchen waste.
Executive director Grant Keenan told letsrecycle.com yesterday ” We are putting in 12 chambers and there is planning permission for another eight. This will meet the needs of Aberdeen city and may have the scope to take out-of-date supermarket food waste as well. We would also like to thank the Waste and Resources Action Programme (WRAP) for their continuing support in the project, without whom none of this would be possible.”
The reconfiguration of the New Deer site – which has cost around £1.2 million for the in-vessel facilities alone – has received £432,000 from WRAP. Other funding has come from Clydesdale bank, the Keenan family and private investors.
The facility is expected to be up and running by July 2008 -during which time VCU will provide technical support.
Peter Hallam, VCU Europa's project development manager, said: “We are delighted to have secured this contract. It has been a long haul and was it not for the commitment shown by the Keenans to take this project from the initial ‘idea', through due diligence, the planning process, WRAP funding and financing, we would not be at this stage today. Now the real work begins and we look forward to supporting Keenan Recycling as this project is brought to fruition.”
Aberdeen council
Aberdeen council already provides a garden waste collection service to 62,000 households but according to council minutes, it plans to roll-out commingled collections of kitchen and garden waste from August 2008.
The details from an August meeting of the council's waste management working group said that up until now the barrier to this service was that “there was no local operator capable of processing food waste”.
Households will be given kitchen caddies with a supply of compostable liners so waste can be easily transferred to the larger brown bin.
Aberdeen council waste chiefs estimate that between 4,000 and 6,000 tonnes of waste could be diverted form landfill as a result of food waste collections.
Un-audited figures show that for 2006/07, the council achieved a recycling/composting rate of 24% for household waste and this is expected to rise to between 27 and 30% with the new collection arrangement.
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