The Duke of Gloucester has officially opened the Greatmoor Energy from Waste (EfW) facility near Aylesbury and praised Buckinghamshire’s move away from landfill to energy generation.
Official opening of the Greatmoor facility by (centre) the Duke of Gloucester with (l) Paul Taylor, chief executive of FCC Environment and (r) Cllr Warren Whyte of Buckinghamshire county council
The Duke was speaking at the opening ceremony yesterday (27 October) for the plant which has been built west of Aylesbury and takes in residual waste from Buckinghamshire local authorities for incineration with energy recovery.
The Greatmoor plant is run by FCC Environment under a 30-year contract awarded in 2012 and was designed and built by Hitachi Zosen INOVA. It can handle 300,000 tonnes of residual waste a year with most of the municipal waste bulked up at FCC’s High Heavens transfer facility near High Wycombe. An additional element of commercial and industrial waste is also taken in.
Addressing council representatives and those involved in developing the Greatmoor plant, the Duke commented on “the terrific efforts you have made in closing your landfill sites, partly because you have had to and you now have a better way of disposing of your waste.” And, he added that “this plant does the right thing environmentally.”
He also touched on recycling and the issue of public confusion over bins. The Duke remarked: “I hope we can all get used to what to put in each bin although sometimes it can be confusing.”
FCC time lapse video of Greatmoor construction
Welcome
At the opening ceremony, Paul Taylor, chief executive of FCC Environment, welcomed guests to what he described as a “really good facility, something we can be proud of. We are here to handle residual waste after all the recycling has taken place. Generating 22MW of power, this is a power station.”
Mr Taylor went on to highlight the importance of moving away from landfill and extracting value from the waste, before thanking all those involved: “there has been a lot of hard work by a lot of people.”
[gallery_placement]Buckinghamshire county council’s cabinet member for planning & environment, Warren Whyte described the official opening as being a “wonderful day”. And, Cllr Whyte spoke of the “huge investment by the county council in the plant”, noting that waste would no longer go to landfill because of the landfill tax and other environmental issues.
Construction of the new EfW facility was funded, explained FCC, through an “innovative use of construction-only finance and prudential borrowing” and began in September 2013. The site is now fully operational employing 46 full time, permanent operatives.
Deliveries
The Greatmoor facility is the primary disposal point for all of Buckinghamshire’s local authority waste.
Aylesbury Vale district council and some of the county’s Household Recycling Centres will deliver waste directly to the facility, with the three southern districts councils (South Buckinghamshire, Chiltern and Wycombe) and the rest of the Recycling Centres using a waste transfer station at High Heavens near High Wycombe.
The waste transfer station, was also built as part of the contract between FCC and Buckinghamshire County Council.
Related links
Buckinghamshire county council
FCC Environment
Hitachi Zosen INNOVA
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Source: letsrecycle.com Waste Managment
