The plan, which was officially published yesterday (March 15), outlines key areas of work for the independent body which was established in 2007 by the Scottish Government to distribute funding to public projects.
Created as an alternative to the PFI/PPP model, the Scottish Futures Trust (SFT) covers a range of industries in the country, such as infrastructure and education.
In the 2011/12 business plan, which is set to see 9 billion allocated to public projects, the SFT intends to support the current portfolio of local authority waste infrastructure projects as they move into procurement phases.
For example, it will support the Ayrshire councils in concluding business cases for their food and residual waste projects, as well as helping Glasgow city council to achieve contract award for its long-term residual waste treatment contract.
Glasgow had intended to develop a host of autoclave treatment plants across the city under its planned residual waste management contract but, in January 2011, the council said it was assessing alternative treatment methods (see letsrecycle.com story).
In addition to Glasgow and Ayrshire, the SFT will look to provide assistance for another large-scale residual waste management plan, in the form of Edinburgh and Midlothian councils joint 500 million, residual waste project (see letsrecycle.com story).
The Zero Waste Project, as the partnership is known, is centred on delivering a 200,000 tonne-a-year capacity residual waste treatment plant and a 30,000 tonne-a-year capacity anaerobic digestion plant (see letsrecycle.com story).
Also within its councils work, SFT intends to work with the councils within the Clyde Valley authority to assess the potential for collaborative working and the procurement of joint waste infrastructure services.
Food
One other main area of work will be working with the Scottish Government and advisory body Zero Waste Scotland to establish a food waste collection and treatment programme for Scotland. This will involve liaising with councils to assess the potential for developing strategic food waste treatment plants.
The food waste scheme is being delivered by advisory body Zero Waste Scotland alongside SFT and is set to see 4 million distributed to projects. The aim of the initiative is to help divert 25,000 tonnes of food waste from landfill each year.
Under the scheme, private companies and councils will be encouraged to divert biodegradable material to composting or other routes such as anaerobic digestion.
Expertise
The Scottish Futures Trust has also established a waste procurement forum in order to help further its expertise in waste. This includes setting up training sessions for local authority waste officers on commercial issues relating to residual waste.
Launching the business plan, Scottish finance secretary John Swinney said: “Sound management of public finances and capital infrastructure has never been more important in light of the deep cuts of more than 35% over the spending period in Scotland’s capital budgets imposed by a Westminster government that is cutting spend too deeply and too quickly.
“That is why SFT is so vital. We already know in its first full year of operation SFT delivered some 111 million of net benefits and savings – well within our expectation of benefits in the region of 100-150 million. We expect SFT will have delivered similar achievements for this current year and will do so again in future years.
The SFT business plan explains that the Scottish waste sector is expected to require 1 billion of investment over the next decade to help achieve goals set out under the Governments Zero Waste Plan, which was published in June 2010 (see letsrecycle.com story).
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