The authority, which handles the waste disposal for seven local authorities in the north of the capital, said that while it would issue a formal notice advertising the contract in the Official Journal of the European Union in “due course”, potential bidders should first contact it with an initial expression of interest by April 14.
Outlining the purpose of the contract in a statement, the NLWA said: “The NLWA is looking to develop a network of new and refurbished waste treatment facilities and to establish a fuel use which optimises energy recovery from solid recovered fuel. Together, these facilities will handle around 3% of the national municipal waste tonnage by 2045.
“The innovative procurement process will include the opportunity for companies to separately bid for the Waste Services Contract and Fuel Use Contract,” it added.
Under the contract, the authority, which dealt with over 900,000 tonnes of municipal solid waste in 2008/09, is looking procure recycling and treatment facilities worth an estimated £600 million to allow it to divert 400,000 tonnes-a-year of waste from landfill by 2020.
The authority has stressed that the final choice of technology will be decided during the procurement process, but the outline business case it submitted to Defra to secure the PFI funding was based on a reference case involving developing two mechanical biological treatment (MBT) facilities using anaerobic digestion, as well as another anaerobic digestion plant.
It also included a large-scale energy-from-waste facility to turn the solid recovered fuel produced by the MBT process into energy, as well as a materials recycling facility, two transfer stations and work to develop the authority's civic amenity site network.
The NLWA expects to award the two contracts in 2012, with the aim of having the waste services deal up and running in 2016 and the fuel use contract operational by 2017.
The seven councils whose waste disposal is carried out by the Authority are: Barnet; Camden; Enfield; Hackney; Haringey; Islington; and, Waltham Forest.
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