Recycling, Renewable Energy, Resource Efficiency

Renewable power and energy from waste

Renewable power technologies include anaerobic digestion, Energy from Waste (EfW) and landfill gas power plants.

Viridor is currently investing in a number of developments to process non-recyclable, non-hazardous household and commercial wastes into re-useable energy.

This includes six anaerobic digestion plants both under construction and planned, and 30 power plants generating ‘green’ electricity at operational and closed landfill sites.

Our total power output now exceeds 100 megawatts with further capacity coming online. This would provide for the domestic needs of a city the size of Bristol or most of Edinburgh.

Energy from Waste (EfW) generates both electricity and useable heat in the form of steam or hot water for local industry, while safely treating non-recyclable residual wastes.

It helps local authorities meet their landfill diversion targets (LATS) and can form an important part of their overall waste management strategies.

EfW is a safe, proven and robust form of resource recovery and is complimentary to high levels of recycling. By producing renewable energy it can help deliver a reduced carbon footprint and improve resource efficiency.

The bottom ash that remains after combustion in EfW plants can be recycled as secondary aggregate for use in construction and engineering.

The Lakeside EfW facility at Colnbrook, near Slough has been built under a joint venture agreement between Viridor and Grundon. Using advanced technology, this plant can process 410,000 tonnes of residual waste per year, generating 37MW of power.

Viridor operates two other EfW facilities and further plants are planned.