A Scots council has renewed a two-year contract to send its food waste to Scottish Water Horizons’ Deerdykes Bioresources Centre to be used to generate renewable energy.
East Dunbartonshire Council has committed to continue sending waste to Scotland’s first large-scale recycling facility near Cumbernauld where it undergoes anaerobic digestion – a process which uses bacteria to break down organic matter.
Colin Lindsay, Operations Manager at Scottish Water Horizons said:
“A less sustainable alternative is to use comingled waste - mixing food and garden rubbish – which goes to composting.
“This generates greenhouse gases – including methane – which are harmful to the environment. Sending waste to a food waste recycling facility which uses anaerobic digestion avoids this issue whilst generating sustainable energy.
“Last year East Dunbartonshire sent 3000 tonnes of food waste to us for processing, that’s the equivalent of more than a quarter of a million weekly food shops, reducing a massive 1850 tonnes of carbon.
“This has been a great effort on East Dunbartonshire’s behalf in encouraging the public to separate their food waste, and we are confident through working together that we can build on that success in the years ahead.”
Anaerobic digester at Deerdykes Bioresources Centre
Ann Davie, Depute Chief Executive, East Dunbartonshire Council added:
“We're very proud of the fact that our residents have consistently been amongst the top recyclers in the country.
“By renewing this contract, we are demonstrating the Council's commitment to ensuring as much food waste as possible in East Dunbartonshire is turned into renewable energy and not sent to landfill.
“We are currently running a campaign to raise awareness locally of what items go in each of our bins to increase our area’s recycling even further.
“So far the response from our residents has been terrific which shows just how passionate they are about this issue.”
Scottish Water Horizons and East Dunbartonshire Council have joined forces on the back of the contract renewal to help drive positive behaviours in recycling food waste.
Whilst food waste should be avoided, if possible, the teams involved are keen to raise awareness of the benefits of properly segregating and recycling waste.
The Deerdykes Bioresources Centre in North Lanarkshire has generated more than 50 GWh of green electricity – the equivalent of powering 13,500 homes for a year – since it opened in 2010.
The facility harnesses gas from food waste using anaerobic digestion to generate green energy using a combined heat and power engine (CHP).
Scottish Water Horizons is a commercial subsidiary of Scottish Water and plays an important part in helping the organisation meet its Net Zero ambitions, by maximising opportunities for green energy production on Scottish Water sites.
Barhale has completed work on two separate Rapid Action Taskforce Spills projects it is carrying out for Severn Trent.
Börger UK, which has firmly established itself as a leading pump brand since it was set up in Staffordshire in 2004, has moved into bigger, brand-new premises in Shrewsbury.
HUBER Technology UK & Ireland are inviting people to register for their March webinar where they will be providing information about HUBER water intake screens for municipal and industrial applications.
Sulzer has launched a new global Center of Excellence (CoE) for Water Treatment Solutions - the CoE consolidates Sulzer’s wastewater treatment expertise in a unified and global manner.
Hear how Scottish Water has completed its £235 million Ayrshire Glasgow Resilience Project - customers across Greater Glasgow, Ayrshire and East Renfrewshire will now benefit from a more secure and resilient water supply.
Hear how United Utilities is accelerating its investment to reduce spills from storm overflows across the Northwest.
Find out more about the remarkable career opportunities on offer at WSP - scroll down to watch the inspirational video.