Centre will convert waste to power for 37,500 homes (From The Northern Echo)

Centre will convert waste to power for 37,500 homes

9:21am Friday 17th September 2010 in North-East Business News By Owen McAteer

MORE than 160 jobs could be created with work on a new centre converting household waste into electricity which is ready to start following a 25-year contract award.

Sita UK won planning permission for its £120m North- East Energy Recovery Centre (NEERC) at Haverton Hill, in Teesside, in 2008.

After learning yesterday that a consortium which it is leading was the preferred bidder to handle 190,000 tonnes of rubbish annually from The South Tyne and Wear Waste Management Partnership, Sita said it would now push on with construction.

It will receive £73.5m of Government Private Finance Initiative (PFI) money from the partnership towards the construction costs at Haverton Hill, and three waste transfer stations, connected to the project.

Over the 25 years the deal will be worth between £543m and £682m to the consortium, which also includes Royal Bank of Scotland and Catalyst Lend Lease. The contract, details of which are to be tied up before the end of the year, will see household rubbish from Gateshead, South Tyneside and Sunderland converted into electricity for 37,500 homes, rather than being sent to landfill.

About 100 construction jobs will be created while the Teesside facility is being built.

Once it is up and running, in 2013, a further 66 jobs should be created both at the plant and in handling the waste at the three centres.

A spokesman for Sita UK said: “It was always the intention to build the facility, but having the preferred bidder status means we will now develop in earnest.”

David Palmer-Jones, chief executive of Sita UK, said: “We are delighted that the South Tyne and Wear Waste Partnership has selected Sita UK as preferred bidder for this major, 25-year PFI project.

“Central to our proposal is the development of an energy- from-waste facility in Teesside. Sixty-six operational jobs will be created – 41 of these at the energy from waste facility and 25 in the partnership area.

“We will refurbish one and develop two new transfer stations in the partnership area.

“As we develop this infrastructure we will consult widely with stakeholders and members of the community.”

The company will also develop an education and visitor centre, in Gateshead, to encourage people to see how waste is managed and find out what they can do to reduce the amount they throw away.

Partnership chairman Councillor Martin Gannon, said: “Forming a partnership with the Sita Consortium to build our treatment facility is a major milestone in the three councils’ quest to find more sustainable ways of managing our waste.”

Energy-from-waste is a process that burns rubbish to create electricity which can be sold to the national grid or turned into steam to heat buildings.

Treating the rubbish in this way will result in a total carbon saving of 64,000 tonnes of CO2 per year compared to sending the waste to landfill.