Gloucestershire latest to announce PFI shortlist

Announced yesterday (July 9), the shortlist is comprised of an assortment of consortiums, waste and recycling companies and energy-from-waste specialists – although the council maintains that it is technology and site neutral at this stage.

Gloucestershire's 25-year contract, which is intended to help divert between 150,000 and 170,000 tonnes of residual waste from landfill each year, is backed by £92 million in PFI-funding that the county secured in November 2008 with energy-from-waste as its reference technology (see letsrecycle.com story).

The shortlist is:

– American energy-from-waste Covanta Energy Limited

– German incineration giant MVV Umwelt GmbH

– Waste management company Veolia ES Aurora; 

– Taunton-based waste and recycling firm Viridor;

– Northampton-based Waste Recycling Group;

– Spanish waste treatment company Urbaser S.A;

– Birmingham-based waste management firm Biffa

– A consortium of London-based waste management firm Cory Environmental Management, energy-from-waste specialists Earth Tech Engineering Limited and Fortum O&M (UK), and Swedish civil engineering company Skanska Construction;

– A consortium called Sustainable Solutions for Gloucestershire (SS4G) – comprised of construction and consultancy Cyril Sweett Investments Limited, Wilshire-based waste and recycling firm Hills Waste Solutions Limited, Bank of Scotland plc, and Surrey-based construction company BAM Nuttall Limited;

– John Laing Investments Limited, a consortium of London-based John Laing Investments, technology provider Keppel Seghers Belgium, and utilities company United Utilities.

Councillor Stan Waddington, lead cabinet member for environment, said: “I'm really pleased with the numbers of bidders that are going through to the next stage. In the current economic climate, to have ten companies showing willingness to invest in Gloucestershire is great news.

“With this many bidders going through there is potential for a range of technologies and sites to come forward with a really good level of competition in general,” he added.

The council, which had been anticipating between three and 10 bidders when the contract was advertised in the Official Journal of the European Union in February this year, hopes to announce the award of the contract in spring 2011.

The move to cut the shortlist represents the second time that Gloucestershire has tried to establish major waste infrastructure in the region, after plans to develop a mechanical biological treatment plant with PFI-funding were scrapped in 2005 due to being “too expensive” (see letsrecycle.com story).