Artist's impression of the Beddington incinerator

The Environment Agency (EA) has issued waste management company Viridor with an environmental permit for the operation of its proposed energy recovery facility (ERF) in Beddington, Sutton.

The permit comes two months after the London Borough of Sutton’s Development Control Committee granted Viridor planning permission to build the £200-million energy-from-waste (EFW) incinerator, which forms part of the waste management company’s 25-year South London Waste Partnership (SLWP) residual waste contract (signed in November 2012).

Whilst there were concerns about the ‘localised air quality impact’ of Viridor’s first planning application in July 2012, the company subsequently amended its application to incorporate improvements to air quality and nature conservation.

Ian John, Head of Planning and Permitting at Viridor, said:“We commissioned thorough and rigorous assessments about any potential impact associated with our facility which were then robustly and stringently tested by the [Environment] Agency’s officers. We welcome their decision to issue a permit for the safe operation of our proposed energy recovery facility.”

Energy from waste

Croydon, Kingston, Merton and Sutton Councils have said that they hope that the proposed ERF will ‘safely and effectively’ eliminate ‘virtually all landfill disposal’ from their boroughs and local businesses, in line with their joint municipal waste management strategy

The proposed ERF will convert around 275,000 tonnes of non-recyclable waste into electricity – enough to power around 30,000 homes – and heat (to be utilised locally) and aims to divert around 95 per cent of waste inputs away from landfill.

The facility will incinerate residual domestic waste and use the steam to drive a turbine that will produce electricity and heat. This will generate up to 26 megawatts (MW) of electricity, of which 22 MW will be fed into the supply grid via an existing sub-station.

The SLWP waste contract demands that Viridor commit to the closure of their existing landfill by the end of 2017, six years earlier than presently required.

Viridor says that the new ERF will create hundreds of jobs during its construction, and 40 permanent roles once operational.

Overcapacity

The Beddington plant is one of the latest of several energy-from-waste plants to get the go-ahead, despite a recent report from Eunomia Research & Consulting suggesting that the UK could see overcapacity in residual waste treatment plants by 2015, if the current rate of construction is not curbed. The report suggests that due to increased emphasis on recycling, reusing and recovering material, residual waste rates are falling, leaving incinerators without the required levels of waste needed to produce efficient and cost-effective processes.

Viridor will provide an interim service to the partnership beginning in April 2014 until the facility is operational in 2017.

Find out more about the Beddington facility or the incineration process.