The waste company says the deal will divert the material from landfill and return resources to the UK economy, with the IBA going on to be used locally in Scotland within the construction and concrete industry.
Rock Solid will also recover “substantial tonnages of both ferrous and non-ferrous metals from the IBA for reuse both locally within Scotland and internationally”.
Pierre Dorel, Viridor’s chief operations officer, said: “Viridor believes that all waste should have a purpose and the contract agreed with Rock Solid is evidence of that commitment. Across Viridor’s UK energy recovery fleet we are committed to partnering with companies which share this commitment and ambition to recycle and re-use resources where this opportunity exists. In the last financial year Viridor returned 668,000 tonnes to the economy through recycling and re-use as an aggregate.”
IBA is the ash that is left over after waste is burnt in an energy recovery plant. The material can contain glass, brick, metals, rubble, sand, grit, metal, stone, concrete, ceramics and fused clinker as well as combusted products such as ash and slag.
Dutch-owned Rock Solid also has an IBA processing agreement in place with MVV Environment, processing material from both its Dundee facility and the Plymouth Efw plant.
Contract
The contract will become operational in “mid to late 2021”, and the residue or ash will be collected by Rock Solid from the EfW plant and delivered to a purpose-built IBA processing facility close to Cowdenbeath.
Rock Solid says it uses “state-of-the-art machinery and recovery techniques” to process the IBA and recover valuable aggregates.
“By processing and recovering in this manner and to this level, there is almost zero residual waste product after the process is complete”
Rock Solid processing general manager Mark Wederell said the company welcomed the new contract with Viridor.
“Not only does this agreement further expand Rock Solid’s already expanding portfolio of IBA processing operations in Scotland, it also demonstrates and reinforces both Viridor’s and Scotland’s commitment to providing a compliant, reliable and viable option for the complete recovery and re-use of all the valuable components recovered from IBA during processing,” he said.
He added: “This re-use is not just limited to ferrous and non-ferrous metals, but is also applicable to the IBA aggregates. By processing and recovering in this manner and to this level, there is almost zero residual waste product after the process is complete. This process is, therefore, central to any circular zero waste strategy being implemented for the benefit of the whole area and the overall Scottish environment.”
Viridor’s Dunbar EfW became operational in early 2019, and has an annual capacity of 300,000 tonnes per year. The site can generate 258GWh of electricity and up to 10MW of heat available for local use.
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