Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Anaerobic Digestion Gets Good Press

The following newspaper article was published in the Shropshire Star on December 1, and provides encouragement to AD. It may have been a press release, but nevertheless the Shropshire Star gave this front page exposure, on a day when a biomass power plant elsewhere in the county was headlined and the plans for that plant were described as "controversial" within a generally negative article.

Biodigester in Town Proving to be a Success

Residents in Ludlow are converting about 600 tonnes of waste food into electricity and compost each year. The food is being saved from landfill thanks to a £2 million-plus biodigester.

Today residents in Ludlow, Shropshire, UK, were thanked for their help in making the town's new food waste collection service a big success.

And they were encouraged to continue using the scheme up to and over the Christmas period.

The waste food collection scheme was launched in May, with food being collected from properties in the town and taken to the biodigester for conversion int electricity and compost.

More than 5,000 properties in Ludlow town are covered by the scheme and new figures show that 75 per cent of these are currently putting their food waste out for collection - up from 66 per cent in June.

On average, just over 3kg of food waste is being collected from each participating property every week. This means that some 550 to 600 tonnes of biodegradable food waste will be diverted from landfill each year.

Today Mark Foxall, Policy and and Strategy Officer with Shropshire Waste Partner ship, said: "Up to and over Christmas we expect there to be a big increase in the amount of food waste that each household produces so we are asking people to continue to use the scheme over this important period - and ask those who don't currently use the service to consider doing so in the weeks ahead."

The food waste collection scheme is run by South Shropshire District Council in partnership with Veolia.

The Shropshire Star

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