A trading update issued by the company ahead of its full year results for the 12 months to March 27 2020, said that trading had been “in line with the Board’s expectations”.
Collections
In the company’s collections division, Biffa said it had “continued to deliver growth” and that introducing higher waste collection charges had mitigated the impact of the Dutch refuse-derived fuel (RDF) tax.
The statement explained: “The Industrial & Commercial (I&C) business has performed well, supported by its ongoing acquisition strategy, and market collection prices have responded to fully mitigate the impact of the recently implemented Dutch tax on Refuse Derived Fuel.”
Biffa added that its municipal business continued to deliver “stable returns, with good operational delivery and new contract tender wins offsetting expected contract expires.”
Plastics
The company’s Resources & Energy division meanwhile also saw growth, which Biffa said was “underpinned by strong performance in the Recycling business, where an increasing demand for recycled plastics has mitigated softness in paper markets.”
This comes after Biffa opened the first phase of a £27.5m PET plastics recycling site in county Durham in January 2020 (see letsrecycle.com story).
“The plant, which can recycle the equivalent of 1.3 bn plastic bottles per annum, was built on budget and on schedule and is expected to be fully operational by the end of the current financial year”, the trading update explained.
Biffa said it was is also investing in a new £7m facility in Washington, Tyne & Wear, which will expand its recycling capabilities for plastic pots, tubs and trays.
“These combined investments will increase Biffa’s total recycled plastic processing capability to 140,000 tonnes per annum.”, it said.
Landfill
With regards to landfill tonnages and landfill gas generation, the company said that levels of both were “in line with expectations”.
In Organics, Biffa said there has been a return to “normalised operational performance” in the second half. This comes after performance in the first half of the year fell behind (6.6% revenue decrease) due to a combination of operational performance issues in West Sussex and the impact of planned maintenance downtime in Poplars.
EfW
As announced on 11 February 2020 (see letsrecycle.com story), Biffa reached financial close on its first EfW plant at Newhurst and will commence operations during 2023.
Biffa confirmed also confirmed at the time that its EfW at the Protos energy park in Cheshire had been delayed.
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