Invitations to negotiate are to be sent out to Biffa, SITA UK, Onyx and the Enterprise-Estech consortium for the waste partnership contract, which includes a 35.8 million PFI award from the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.
” If we are to cut our reliance on landfill and avoid penalties then we need to see further improvements in waste reduction and recycling. “
– Frank Mulgrew, Shropshire Waste Partnership
The contract will cover the five councils Shropshire county council, Bridgenorth district, North Shropshire district, Oswestry borough and South Shropshire district council.
Shrewsbury and Atcham council is not currently a member of the partnership, though discussions are taking place between the borough council and SWP on the overall development of waste strategy within the county.
A deadline of 24 June has been set for responses from the contractors, with a preferred bidder expected to be announced by January next year and the final contract agreed by September, with work starting in early 2007.
The new contract sets ambitious targets to reduce landfill and improve recycling rates within the partnership area which generates around 175,000 tonnes of municipal waste a year. The contract will see a contractor having to reach a recycling target of 55% for household waste by 2015 and 60% by 2020.
Improvement
By the end of this year, the county hopes that it will hit a recycling level of 30%, underlining a marked improvement in waste reduction which has seen Shropshire increase its recycling rates from a low of just 8% in 2000 to 23% in the official figures for 2003/04.
The latest Defra figures also showed improvements by other members of the Partnership, with South Shropshire, Bridgnorth and North Shropshire and Oswestry all recording year-on-year increases in the percentage of waste recycled and all exceeding their formal government targets.
Frank Mulgrew, executive officer for the SWP, said: “The waste contract places great stress on improving recycling levels and we recognise that it has set out some very ambitious targets.
“Obviously we will discuss how we can achieve this in detail with contractors, but if we are to cut our reliance on landfill and avoid penalties then we need to see further improvements in waste reduction and recycling.”
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The Partnership opened a 4 million waste management centre at Battlefield Enterprise Park, Shrewsbury in February, which is designed to handle up to 100,000 tonnes of waste a year. It includes recycling facilities and a materials recovery facility as well as a waste transfer station which is also used by Shrewsbury & Atcham borough council.
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