Geminor looks to ‘pivot away’ from exports market in UK

Traditionally Geminor focused on the export of alternative fuels (RDF and SRF) to – and within – Scandinavia but has now expanded into a range of material streams.

And, while its UK and Ireland tonnage volumes reduced in 2021 to 408,000 tonnes because of the pandemic (452,000 tonnes in 2020), it expects to handle more than 500,000 tonnes this year.

Recycling

In its report for the whole company this week, Geminor, which has its UK base in Keele, Staffordshire, said it handled more than 1.73 million tonnes of waste in Europe in 2021. It said: “The recycling of waste wood, waste paper and plastics increased sharply, and the handling of feedstock for material recycling went up by 38% last year.”

The company noted: “With a total volume of 1,731,066 tonnes, Geminor consolidates its position as one of Europe’s leading waste management companies in 2021. Refuse-Derived Fuel (RDF) and Solid Recovered Fuel (SRF) still account for around two thirds of the total volume for Geminor in Europe, which due to COVID has fallen marginally by 3% compared to 2020.”

Geminor’s decline in RDF and SRF volumes in 2021 was counterbalanced by an increase in the handling of waste wood by 70,800 tonnes to a total of 382,727 tonnes, making it the second-largest material. The handling and shipment of waste paper increased by around 36% to 88,000 tonnes and the handling of hazardous waste went up by almost 70%, to 29,000 tonnes.

CEO at Geminor, Kjetil Vikingstad, commented: “We are delighted to have met our target of more than 200,000 tonnes for material recycling by the year 2022.”

Mr Vikingstad reflected on 2021 and Covid-19. He said: “The COVID-year 2021 has been another challenging year for the European waste industry in terms of volumes, logistics, transport, and varying market mechanisms. The RDF market, in particular, has differed with lower volumes in circulation due to reduced exports from countries such as the UK and Finland. At the same time, other countries have experienced growth – such as Poland, Denmark, and Italy – which has helped obtain a balance in the market.”

UK

In the UK, country manager James Maiden explained that the company is broadening its range of activities so that it will have about a 50:50 balance between RDF/energy and other materials. He said: “We are doing more internally and looking to pivot away from the export market.”

On the supply front its contracts range from south west England to Scotland. It has an agreement to feed the moving grate energy from waste plant in Bridgewater, Somerset. Although this has been delayed it is due to start commissioning this spring, said Mr Maiden.

Among its successes, the company saw in 2021 a deal agreed to supply the planned Oldhall energy from waste plant in Irvine, Scotland with RDF. Other UK work includes four local authority contracts.

Plastics

In 2021 Geminor’s handling of waste plastic almost doubled to 10,500 tonnes. Plastics recycling has become a growth area for the business – last year it revealed that Norwegian plastics chemical recycling business Quantafuel had taken a 40% stake in the company. The two Norwegian firms said the acquisition made them “industry partners” in the development of chemical plastics recycling in Europe.

Geminor’s connection to the chemical recycling of plastics in the UK has now strengthened with Quantafuel taking a 100% share of its UK subsidiaries, Quantafuel UK Ltd, Quantafuel Sunderland Limited and Quantafuel Cheshire Limited at the end of December 2021.

Quantafuel’s project portfolio in the UK has grown over the past years, with “key prospects” in Sunderland and Cheshire, the company said. In September 2021, it submitted a preliminary planning application for the Sunderland project on a 12 acre site in the Port of Sunderland. Here it plans to build a pyrolysis plant that can process 110,000 tonnes of plastic per year to open in 2024.

Consultation meetings with Sunderland residents to be held last month have been delayed although an online consultation has opened. The raw materials produced in the plant will be shipped to customers in the petrochemical industry, while gas produced will be used to power the plant, says Quantafuel.

Meanwhile, Geminor is developing a plant down the coast at Hull (see letsrecycle.com story)  which is due to produce “low-carbon RDF” for the domestic and international market and deliver plastic fractions to Quantafuel’s planned chemical recycling facility in Sunderland.