“Key” facility opened under Berkshire councils’ PFI

The Smallmead Waste Management Park is home to a 75,000 tonne-a-year materials recycling facility (MRF), a 200,000 tonne-a-year capacity waste transfer station, a household waste recycling centre and a visitor education centre.

It was built under the 25-year PFI deal which was signed between Northampton-based WRG and the alliance between Reading borough council, Bracknell Forest borough council and Wokingham borough council in November 2006 (see letsrecycle.com story).

Speaking to letsrecycle.com at Tuesday's opening, Oliver Burt, project manager for the partnership, said that for the re3 councils it represented “the culmination of 10 years' of work” since they had begun to work together on waste in 1999.

In particular, he said the MRF, which has been accepting recyclables since January 2009 operating at a 25,000 tonne-a-year single shift capacity, “provides us with certainty that our materials are going to be sorted out at a level that they can be properly marketed.”

The MRF is used to sort commingled recyclables collected from across the partnership, which are: aluminium cans; cardboard; paper; plastic bottles; and, steel cans.

Mr Burt hailed the fact that “in two and a half years everything has come together”, and added that “the significance of today is this is what happens when you sign on the dotted line”.

The part played by the councils in getting the facility off the ground was praised by WRG's chief executive, Jim Meredith, who said: “I think the councils have been fundamental in the way they have approached it.”

Labelling Smallmead the “key” facility the company is delivering under the PFI deal, he explained that “this is the facility where the majority of the logistics and sorting is delivered.”

Bracknell

WRG is also set to officially open a second waste management park at Longshot Lane in Bracknell next Monday (July 13), as part of the re3 contract.

As with the Smallmead redevelopment, the project involves the refurbishment of an existing HWRC, and it will also offer a redeveloped 100,000 tonne-a-year capacity waste transfer station and a visitor education centre.

Together, the two developments come at a capital cost of £28.4 million, and the councils hope that they will help them to reach a 50% recycling rate by 2020.

Under the deal, 60,000 tonnes-a-year of residual household waste which is currently sent to landfill in Oxfordshire will be sent to the Lakeside energy-from-waste facility at Colnbrook under a third party contract with the plant's joint operators Grundon and Viridor (see letsrecycle.com story https://www.letsrecycle.com/do/ecco.py/view_item?listid=37&listcatid=231&listitemid=8148).

And, Chris Ellis, WRG's operations director for the South, explained that hot commissioning – the last stage of testing before a plant becomes operational – was currently being undertaken at the Lakeside plant.

Bettison

Councillor Paul Bettison, leader of Bracknell Forest borough council and chair of the Local Government Association's environment board, praised the partnership working on the contract, both between the councils and with their contractor.

“I'm very pleased that Bracknell Forest, Reading and Wokingham councils have worked together in such an effective and positive partnership to provide a high quality, long term solution to the need to waste less and recycle more across the three boroughs,” he said.

“They have worked together with WRG to make re3 happen and deliver a successful PFI project at a time when the economic slowdown is making such schemes less easy to achieve”, he added.