The blaze which started over the weekend was still smouldering on Monday morning with several fire appliances still tackling the incident. A fire service source said that much of the equipment in the plant appeared to have been damaged. Sides of the building have been ripped off with debris lying alongside the outer rim and a large portion of the roof is missing.
 Material within the MRF at Milton Keynes was still smouldering today while the fire brigade started to investigate the cause |
The blaze at Milton Keynes will put severe pressure on recycling sorting plants in South East England where there is already a shortage of capacity. A number of local authorities use Milton Keynes and some were unaware this morning that a fire had taken place. An attempted delivery by Dacorum borough council saw the driver having to phone his own local authority to await instructions.
The plant is currently leased by Milton Keynes borough council to Community Waste which in turn is owned by Cutts Recycling and London-based Atlantic Paper.
This morning (Monday) senior officials from Community Waste, led by managing director Richard Cutts, entered part of the building escorted by fire safety officials.
Mr Cutts said: “While being a set back we expect to be fully operational again within 16 to 24 weeks.” Mr Cutts said that an electrical fault was the possible cause of the fire.
 Community Waste won a tender to run the MRF last year for Milton Keynes borough council |
He said the company was looking at other options for sorting material including a sorting facility that Cutts already has in Doncaster. He explained that the smoke coming from the building on Monday morning was from paper within the facility which was contained within loads of dry recyclables.
Gill King, who has responsibility for recycling at Milton Keynes borough council, was at the MRF this morning in talks with Community Waste over the way forward. She told letsrecycle.com that the council would temporarily store pink bag dry recyclable collections by its collection contractor Cory Environmental.
Ms King added that the authority had a temporary solution for its recyclables and would be making use of glass storage bays at the MRF. However, Milton Keynes would not be involved in making arrangements for other local authorities who are Community Waste customers.
The front of the building, which is thought to house the education centre, did not suffer so badly. The fire is believed to have started on the top floor of the plant.
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