The North Wales Consortium of Denbighshire County Council, Conwy County Borough Council and Flintshire County Council has chosen its preferred bidder for a 15 year design, build, fund and operate food recycling contract.
The preferred bidder is TEG Environmental. The decision to choose TEG was reached following a two year evaluation process involving a number of high quality bidders.
Providing it receives planning consent and Environment Agency approval, the brand new anaerobic digestion facility will be built at the former abattoir site, Waen, St Asaph, Denbighshire. The facility will recycle the food waste that the three councils collect in their respective areas.
Project Lead Authority Denbighshire County Council Member for Environment Councillor Sharon Frobisher said “We are delighted to make this announcement. The facility is a vital piece in the jigsaw to enable us to recycle even more food waste from our households. Our new AD facility will be good for the environment, because it will be generate electricity from the food waste that people have thrown away”.
Welsh Government Environment Minister John Griffiths said: “Food waste management is a key priority in the Welsh Government’s Municipal Sector Plan for waste. Every Welsh local authority runs a separate food waste collection, which will reach nine out of ten Welsh homes by the end of the year.
“There is compelling evidence that anaerobic digestion is the best solution for treating unavoidable food waste. Our aim is to have adequate food waste treatment capacity in place to meet the 2012 – 2013 statutory recycling targets; today’s announcement marks a significant step towards reaching this capacity in North Wales.”
Chief Executive of TEG, Mick Fishwick said: “We are extremely pleased to have been awarded this prestigious long term contract by the North East Wales Hub and we look forward to working with the Hub and to constructing our first AD facility in Wales. It is also very pleasing to see our partnership with Alkane reach fruition and we look forward to working with Alkane in our new joint venture company.”
Alkane Chief Executive Neil O’Brien said: “We are delighted at this award of Preferred Bidder for North East Wales. This type of operation is a recognised solution to the UK Governments stated objectives in complying with both EU landfill targets and de-carbonising the UK electricity market and the electricity generated will benefit from premium selling prices through the Feed-in Tariff scheme. The Alkane/TEG collaboration deal is proving its worth combining our heritage in waste management and energy generation.”
