The situation has been ‘exacerbated’ by FCC Environment’s decision to close its Arpley landfill site in December, a progress report published by MRWA on Friday (3 February) reveals.
MRWA signed a 30-year Resource Recovery Contract with MERL in 2013, a consortium consisting of waste contractor Suez, Sembcorp UK and investment firm I-Environment, part of the ITOCHU Coporation (see letsrecycle.com story).
Under the contract, the consortium is due to deliver an energy from waste plant at Wilton in Teesside capable of processing more than 400,000 tonnes of waste per year, as well as a rail loading transfer station at Knowsley, Merseyside, to transport the region’s residual waste across the country.
The report notes that commissioning at Wilton is now complete, with operations formally handed over from the construction contractor to Suez following a two-month delay in December.
Rail
However, MRWA revealed that completion of the rail transfer facility has been hampered by ‘technical challenges’, which the report explains are due to the waste compactors currently not being able to operate to design capacity.
In addition, the facility has suffered odour management issues which were first reported to MRWA in November 2016. Since then, Suez has commissioned Odournet to undertake a review of the site, while the waste firm has also emptied and cleaned the waste reception pits.
The setback has restricted Suez’s ability to transfer waste by rail to Wilton, meaning that while the EfW plant is operational, it formally remains in commissioning until full operations can be achieved.
Landfill
Meanwhile, FCC Environment has stopped accepting waste at its Arpley landfill site – a major outlet for MRWA before and during the time the MERL project has been under development.
When MRWA had signed the MERL agreement, it had anticipated the Arpley landfill site would close in 2020/21. However, in July last year FCC informed the Authority this date would be brought forward to end of January 2017.
This would not have been a ‘significant issue’ had the MERL contract been delivered on time, MRWA noted in the report.
However, the report notes, due to a delay in commissioning at Wilton, the Authority had continued to send tonnages to the landfill site which has ‘filled up more quickly than anticipated’. As a consequence, the Arpley site was no longer available after mid-December 2016.
FCC had offered its Gowy landfill site as an alternative until the end of January, however the site is limited in terms of the daily tonnage it can accept.
Interim
As a result, MRWA has ‘swiftly’ awarded an interim contract to Suez, valued at £3.4 million, which will utilise ‘a range of residual waste disposal outlets with third party operators across the north-west’ while technical issues at the rail transfer station are addressed.
The MRWA report continues: “The delays in commissioning, full operation and the closure of the main landfill facility means the Authority’s contracts team has made alternative arrangements, via the landfill operator’s alternative facilities, through the RRC contractor’s facilities and via their temporary arrangements with Suez to ensure that the Authority has sufficient disposal points available for Merseyside’s waste.”
The report goes on to single out Veolia – its organic waste and recycling processor – for responding ‘flexibly’ and supplying transport for waste to disposal points ‘after the date when their planned fleet was no longer due to go to landfill’.
Rates
The continued delay means there is expected to be ‘an extended period of disposals to landfill’. However, the rate paid to MERL for commissioning and rates paid for the interim arrangements results in a lower cost to the MRWA than it had budgeted for.
“These temporary arrangements are expected to keep Merseyside residual waste services operating as normal.”
Carl Beer, chief executive
MRWA
The report notes: “The outcome of the revised estimate exercise is that the projected level of spending for 2016/17 is likely to be £71.981m which is £3.511m lower than originally agreed. The majority of this decrease has arisen because of the delays in commissioning and starting to achieve full service on the RRC.”
Carl Beer, chief executive of the MRWA, said: “These temporary arrangements are expected to keep Merseyside residual waste services operating as normal, and there shouldn’t be any negative financial impact on the Authority. Once the technical issues at the Kirkby RTLS are resolved, and the facility becomes fully operational, it will be handed over to Suez so that we can begin the full Resource Recovery Contract.”
Merseyside Energy Recovery Limited is expected to issue a formal statement later this week.
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