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Essex Waste Partnership £100 million boost to reduce landfill

NEWS RELEASE

Ref: 251/09
Date: 29 October 2009

Waste treatment facilities in Essex were today given a boost when the Essex County Council and Southend-on-Sea Borough Council waste disposal partnership was awarded £100.9 million in Private Finance Initiative (PFI) credits.

The project will divert an additional 185,000 tonnes of biodegradable municipal waste (BMW) from landfill per year by 2020, making an important contribution to the partnership’s total potential diversion from landfill.

The Partnership is also committed to a long-term recycling and composting rate of at least 57% per cent to be achieved by 2020 through joint working with its district and borough council partners.

Environment Minister Dan Norris said:
“Making better use of our waste and reducing our reliance on landfill  is an essential part of the drive to tackle climate change.  I welcome the ambitious commitment made by this partnership.

“The partnership will create a real incentive for the local authorities and industry to work together to reduce waste and create jobs, as well as reducing the environmental impact of landfill.”

The project could see a reduction of approximately 95,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions each year compared with current operations, equal to taking approximately 30,000 cars off the road. In addition, this project is expected to create approximately 80 jobs during construction and a further 43 once the plant is operational. 

 

Notes to editors

  1. The authorities will be issuing their joint contract notice to prospective bidders in the Official Journal of the European Union over the next month. The climate change impacts of the proposed technologies will be assessed during the procurement process.
  2. To date over £2.6 billion has been committed to 38 projects including this one.
  3. The Comprehensive Spending Review 2007 provided Defra with additional funding through PFI. The overall level has increased from £280 million in 2007/08 to £600 million in 2008/09, before rising to £700 million over the following years, totaling £2 billion of further investment in waste infrastructure.
  4. Municipal waste management statistics for 2007/08 in England were published by Defra on 6 November 2008. The total amount of collected municipal waste has decreased from 29.1 million tonnes in 2006/07, to an estimated 28.5 million tonnes in 2007/08, a decrease of 2.2 per cent. The average annual change in municipal waste over the five years to 2007/08 was a decrease of 0.6 per cent.
  5. The UK has been set targets to reduce the amount of waste it sends to landfill under the EU Landfill Directive. The UK has a target to reduce the volume of biodegradable municipal waste sent to landfill to 75 per cent of the 1995 levels by 2010; 50 per cent by 2013; and 35 per cent by 2020.
  6. The administrative areas of Essex & Southend generated approximately 780,000 tonnes of municipal waste in 2008/9, of which 43% was recycled.

Further information

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Page published: 29 October 2009