Pennon Group, through its subsidiary, Viridor Oxfordshire, has signed the 25-year Oxfordshire residual waste treatment public private partnership (PPP) contract with Oxfordshire County Council in England.
The contract requires the diversion and treatment of Oxfordshire’s residual municipal waste through the financing, construction and operation of a new Energy from Waste (EfW) plant at Viridor’s site at Ardley near Bicester in Oxfordshire.
The contract includes construction and operation of EfW plants, and it relates to approximately 150,000 tonnes per annum of residual waste and is designed to divert from landfill 95% of waste delivered to the facility.
Under the contract, residual waste, which is being diverted from landfill in line, will be treated with the European Landfill Directive.
The Ardley EfW plant is being built primarily for the Oxfordshire PPP contract although the plant will be available for the market more generally, as steeply rising landfill tax drives residual waste disposal away from landfill towards EfW, the company said
Viridor has received planning permission to build the relevant plant, whcih requires capital investment of approximately £205m by Viridor for a 300,000 tonnes per annum capacity plant.
The plant will be built by CNIM Clugston Oxfordshire, a joint venture between Clugston Construction and Constructions Industrielles De La Mediterranee.
Viridor CEO Colin Drummond said that the new plant will have a gross electrical power generation capacity of 25MW and will also be CHP enabled; it is due to come on stream in 2014.