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Leicester wins PFI grant for waste treatment plant

Leicester city council has won Private Finance Initiative funding for a recycling and waste management contract which could be worth 200 million over a 20-25 period.

Confirmation of the PFI commitment came yesterday from the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions.

The contract will call for construction of a dry materials recycling facility (MRF) with a dirty MRF facility as well.

Currently Leicester is typical of many authorities having a 13% recycling rate with the remainder of the waste going to landfill. Recyclables are collected through a green bag scheme with wheeled bins used for waste. Collection contractor is SITA.

With the city’s landfill sites about 6 miles away set to close in about three years time and new landfill sites further away, the council researched into how it could handle more waste within the city area.

Waste management chief Steve Weston explained: “We took a holistic view and recognised that there was a need to treat the waste that we receive because the wheeled bins contain organics and recyclable waste from non-participants and from those who do not recycle everything they could”.

The council will be inviting tenders in January for construction and operation of a waste treatment facility which will consist of a dry MRF with pre-treatment facilities that will take the food and organics out for composting (either aerobically or anaerobically) and also take out recylables including metal cans.

The DETR is thought to have favoured the project for PFI because it is currently working out how exactly UK legislation should interpret the pre-treatment requirements for landfilled municipal waste that are contained in the Landfill Directive. The Leicester approach could signal the way the DETR is thinking.

The city hopes that the new plant will be fully operational by 2004 with work starting in 2002. The successful contractor will run the council’s existing MRF, fitted out by O.Kay Engineering and Ken Mills in 1995, until 2004 and will be expected to swiftly drive up composting rates to help the city reach a 40% recycling rate during 2004/2005.

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