Incinerator bid to burn more waste
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RUNCORN incinerator operator Viridor has applied to increase the amount of waste that can be delivered by road to be burned at the energy-from-waste (EfW) plant – potentially bringing the total amount of rubbish to be burned per year to more than 1.2m tonnes.
Under the plans, the tonnage of rubbish that can be transported by heavy goods vehicle (HGV) would be scrapped and replaced with limits on the number of trips HGVs can make to and from the EfW facility.
At present, Viridor is permitted to deliver 480,000 tonnes of waste by road and to make 386 journeys via the plant every day.
This is the total amount of rubbish brought in, and by-products removed.
It now wants to remove the weight limit and instead agree to make no more than 386 HGV trips per day and 1,930 trips per week.
An application filed by Viridor said that at present, HGVs account for an average of 216 journeys to and from the plant per day.
Viridor told the Weekly News it could say what the maximum load per wagon is expected to be as loads will not always be full and therefore predictions based on maximum loads would be ‘misleading’.
However, assuming that the HGVs will on average carry the same amount of waste as they did in 2017, the Weekly News has used the increase from 216 to 386 trips to work out that the proposed increase could raise the amount of waste or ‘refuse-derived fuel’ (RDF) delivered by road from 480,000 tonnes to about 858,000 tonnes.
When added to waste delivered by other means such as rail, the application suggests that Viridor could be aiming to burn in the region of 1.23m tonnes per year.
The incinerator is already the biggest in the UK.
An Environmental Information Regulations request from the Weekly News in late 2016 revealed the next largest EfW plant was Belvedere in Kent with a capacity to burn 785,000 tonnes a year.
It generates enough energy to power chemical giant Ineos’s neighbouring Inovyn site and 90,000 homes.
Viridor has said that under the conditions of its environmental permit, there is no limit to how much waste the plant can burn but only on how much it can import.
At present that limit is 850,000 tonnes.
According to the planning application, last year it imported 890,000 tonnes – or 920,000 tonnes in total including lost vapours during time in the site ‘bunker’.
The incinerator proven controversial.
A class action is under way at present over complaints from approximately 150 residents who say the plant has caused noise, steam and odour problems in nearby residential areas.
A cross-party group of politicians has also called for an incinerator tax and for a memorandum on new plants being built.
Viridor’s application also comes as the results of a major health study into the health effects of incinerators is expected to be published this autumn.
A minister told Halton MP Derek Twigg that the Small Area Health Statistics Unit report was submitted for peer review in July with publication to follow ‘in a few months’.
Consultation is open until September 20 with Halton Council aiming to decide the matter by around December 11.
To read the full application and view data such as air quality, noise and carbon emissions forecasts, visit Halton Council’s planning portal and search for application 18/00417/S73.
Alternatively, ask at Runcorn Town Hall or the Municipal Building in Widnes.
Viridor was approached for comment. has