A Round-Up of Anaerobic Digestion UK Food Waste News June to July 2013

It has been easy for us to provide an internet news roundup for UK Food Waste this month, because we are spoilt for choice! 

There are a number of news items which have been posted for a variety of food waste anaerobic digestion projects which show that Anaerobic Digestion UK is doing OK. This news seems to confirm the gradual growth of business in the AD sector.

In Knutsford, Cheshire, a power plant application seems to be stumbling somewhat, but in Scotland it is a different matter with a £4.5m food waste anaerobic digestion plant agreed.

In Wales, they are ahead of the game with a new Biogen and Iona Capital plant opened, and in the commercial sector Mark & Spencer is clearly doing very well to digest almost 90% of its food waste already, and is reporting internally on their waste plans including plans for further Anaerobic Digestion treatment.

That just leaves the farm biogas sector to report on, and again, there is positive news with Wyke Farms including biogas power in their announced £3m spend on self sufficiency. We finish up with information on the Green Investment Bank's (GIB) own market report for anaerobic digestion, which moves the bank on with its policy making and investment strategy work on funding within our sector. The new report will help to inform the GIB’s strategy on debt investment in the sector as well as being a useful resource for the industry and investment community.

UK Anaerobic Digestion (Food Waste) News in More Detail

The Integrated Waste Plant (waste and power plant) in Twemlow by Cres Biogas has hit turbulence. See more at: ᔥCouncil's stance on power plant comes as a shock to residents - Knutsford Guardian “The EA objected to the application in February, causing the applicant to make amendments that supposedly answered all its concerns.

The EA’s report prompted the Health Protection Agency to publish concerns for public health, and the local school to withdraw its support.

So, it seems unfortunate that the parish council continues to support plans that the EA have objected to.” The proposal includes 47,000 tonnes of slurry and food waste coming in to the AD plant and 41,000 tonnes of digestate being removed."

ᔥTEG Group secures £2m Perth and Kinross Council waste contract - The Courier

The new two-year deal will see the firm treat between 20,000 and 25,000 tonnes of garden and food waste per year at its base near Glenfarg, and includes an option to extend for a further two-year period. While TEG has dealt with the ... The £4.5m plant ...

ᔥPrince of Wales visits first Welsh Local Authority developed anaerobic ... - PR Web (press release)

"Caernarfon, Gwynedd (PRWEB UK) 5 July 2013 Biogen and Iona Capital have welcomed His Royal Highness The Prince of Wales, to the Biogen GwyriAD Anaerobic Digestion plant, the first anaerobic digestion plant built specifically under the Welsh Government’s renewable energy policy. His Royal Highness visited the plant at Llwyn Isaf in Gwynedd, North Wales ahead of the full operations starting at the end of the summer."

ᔥThe Top 8 Things We Learned from Marks & Spencer's 2013 Plan A Report - Sustainable Brands

"While it isn't entirely clear where all of this waste is diverted, it is evident that 89% of food waste is being composted or anaerobically digested for conversion to biogas, any clothing waste is being donated or recycled, and all construction waste ..."

ᔥEA official wins AD hero of the year - letsrecycle.com

"An onsite anaerobic digestion plant run by crops producer Barfoots at Botley, Hampshire has won the Best AD Project Award at the UK AD & Biogas Industry Awards 2013. Dr Clare Lukehurst (left) was presented with her lifetime achievement award by Dr ..."

ᔥ£3M step on the road to self-sufficient energy - FoodManufacture.co.uk

 "Cheesemaker Wyke Farms is aiming to be 100% self sufficient in green energy after ploughing £3M into a biogas and solar project." 

Returning now to the subject of the UK's Green Investment Bank, there is further encouragement that more funding will be available, in the extract below.

  ᔥGreen Investment Bank (GIB) publishes market report on Anaerobic Digestion - Renewable Energy Magazine (press release)

"...The bank is also actively investigating the opportunities for debt financing for AD projects. Government research has indicated that AD could deliver between 3 and 5 TWh of electricity by 2020 but the industry itself remains concerned about sources of funding, particularly in relation to senior debt finance."

Summary of this Roundup in Anaerobic Digestion UK Projects

So, despite slow and indecisive government action, the anaerobic digestion industry moves forward... Clearly, the industry is making it's case heard well enough for a measured growth, but if the coalition had meant what it said about "being the greenest government yet", when it came into power. we would surely be much further ahead by now?

Anaerobic Digestion Plant Opens at Langage Farm, Devon, UK

Posted on July 2, 2011 by David

Devon dairy launches anaerobic digestion facility to fuel clotted cream production

Lord Henley and Gary Jones from Langage Farm

A Devonshire dairy has officially opened a £3.4m anaerobic digestion (AD) facility that will turn food waste from around the county into the energy that will help produce its clotted cream, ice cream crème fraiche and yoghurt.

The facility at Langage Farm, Plymouth, received £1.2m of funding from the Anaerobic Digestion Demonstration Programme and was opened by Lord Henley, Minister for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, on Friday 1 July.

By the end of its first year of operation, the AD facility will process 12,000 tonnes of food waste collected from households across the county by local authorities. The facility will also process on-farm dairy wastes, converting these fuels into renewable heat and electricity.

The renewable energy will not only power the dairy products production, but also export surplus energy to the National Grid. In its first five years, the Langage AD facility expects to produce 20,000 MW of energy saving the equivalent of 2,000  tonnes of CO2 per annum on energy bills.

Lord Henley, Gary Jones, Gary Streeter MP, Marcus Gover and James Harvey

Lord Henley said: “The facility at Langage Farm is an excellent working example of how a localised closed loop economy can be created. Food waste that otherwise would have gone to landfill will instead be used to produce the energy that will power much of the production process here on the farm, helping to produce award winning clotted cream, ice cream and yoghurt.”

Marcus Gover, Director of Organics and Energy from Waste at WRAP, believes the market, including investors, developers and end users, should be confident of AD as a reliable, safe and profitable resource efficiency process.

“AD is a growing part of the resource efficiency solution, capable of diverting biodegradable waste from landfill, creating renewable energy, stimulating the green economy and improving the sustainability of commercial agriculture. We really see it as a huge opportunity for the UK.”

A spokesperson for Langage Farm said: “We are proud to be a part of the solution to local waste problems and hope to see an increase in the uptake of this technology in the future, it really makes sense to use waste as a resource in this way.”

Government must prioritise food waste for AD - New Energy Focus

Friday 08 October 2010

ADBA claims food waste should be prioritised for AD over incineration and composting

The government must prioritise food waste for anaerobic digestion due to the benefit of energy generation, a renewables trade body has claimed.

In response to the coalition's Waste Review, which closed yesterday (October 7), the Anaerobic Digestion and Biogas Association (ADBA) has called for food waste to go to AD over composting and incineration.

And, it has stressed the need for a massive increase in household food waste collection and is advocating separate collections, where households have a bin reserved for food waste, so that the "valuable" resource can be more easily used for AD.

ADBA notes that the coalition is committed to a ‘huge increase in energy from waste through anaerobic digestion', but claims that the government will fail to achieve this unless the waste is made available for digestion. This will require changes to waste collection, and priority for treatment through AD, it says.

With cuts imminent in this month's Spending Review, ADBA highlights that many local authorities may be considering shelving schemes to segregate food. However, the association claims that while there are short term savings available now, they will lead to much higher costs to the whole community in the medium term, "especially if we do not build an infrastructure to deal with organic waste away from landfill".

According to ADBA, processing waste through AD offers a sustainable solution for landfill waste, with the added benefit of preserving crucial finite nutrients, such as nitrates and phosphorus.

Commenting on the need to secure food waste for AD, ADBA chairman, Lord Redesdale, said:

"The government knows it must act now to meet the UK's responsibilities on climate change.
Committing to AD technology was a good first step, but it must be followed up by the right decisions about how we deal with waste if the industry is to flourish."

"We need to collect food waste and prioritise it for AD, so that it can make the maximum possible contribution to targets for renewable energy, climate change, landfill mitigation and preserving resources such as phosphorus. This review needs to do more than move towards a "zero-waste" economy, it must also ensure we maximise the use of waste as a valuable resource."

The association added that if supported appropriately, AD could meet up to 40% of the UK's target for renewable heat production by 2020.

View the original article here

Defra Announces New Anaerobic Digestion Initiative

Anaerobic digestion: new energy initiative

Food Waste

Farming Minister Jane Kennedy, speaking at the annual conference of the National Farmers Union in Birmingham on 18 February 2009, announced a new joint initiative with the public and private sector to make greater use of anaerobic digestion – the technology which produces energy from organic material like food waste and manure.

Ms Kennedy said:

"We're producing more organic waste in this country than we can handle, over 12 million tonnes of food waste a year – and farmers know all too well the challenges of managing manure and slurry.

"There are alternatives to sending organic waste to landfill. Anaerobic digestion is a true solution.

"This material could produce enough heat and power to run more than two million homes – helping to prevent dangerous climate change by providing a renewable energy source as well as reducing our reliance on landfill."

A report, ‘Anaerobic Digestion – Shared Goals’, has been drawn up in discussion with a wide cross section of the business community including: agriculture and biogas industries, supermarkets, water and energy companies, the waste and food sectors, Regional Development Agencies, local government, and regulators. It sets out collective ambitions for the use of this technology.

Ms Kennedy will also convene a new Task Group, to be chaired by Steve Lee, Chief Executive Officer of the Chartered Institution of Wastes Management (CIWM), and with members drawn from a broad range of sectors. It will lead the development of an implementation plan setting out the practical measures that Government and stakeholders will take individually and collectively to achieve these shared goals.

More here, and a link to the Defra Shared Goals Report - at least it appeared to be but was not working when we tried to access it!

Agri-food Producers Could Do More to Send Food Waste to Anaerobic Digestion Plants says Greg Hilton

Bidwells Proposes Anaerobic Solution

Agri-food businesses and householders alike could be diverting more of their food waste to anaerobic digestion plants in order to save on volumes going to landfill and creating a renewable energy source.

Greg Hilton, Renewable Energy consultant for Bidwells Agribusiness said: “We throw away over 6 million tonnes of food waste each year, with the vast majority going to landfill. If we used just 10 per cent of this food waste in AD plants we would be able to supply 50,000 houses with clean, green energy. We would also have a significant impact on our carbon emissions as the food sector is responsible for around 20 per cent of the entire UK carbon emissions.

Diverting food waste from landfill, where it produces the damaging greenhouse gas methane, would make a big difference." The outputs of AD are electricity for use on site or export to the national grid, as well as heat for use in the business or nearby properties, and a rich bio-fertiliser, which could have added benefits for horticultural and agricultural land.

Increases in landfill tax and increased returns from renewable electricity are likely to make AD increasingly attractive in the future. Hilton said: "Anaerobic Digestion offers a win-win situation. It diverts waste from going to landfill, reduces greenhouse gas emissions, and provides high value, sustainable energy.

As energy prices increase, technology develops and pressure mounts to reduce carbon emissions, measures that are green and sustainable become increasingly popular and more viable.

At Bidwells we have…experience in evaluating the technical and economic viability of anaerobic digestion and biomass combined heat and power systems, and we predict that more and more projects will become economically viable over the coming years as margins improve and set up costs fall."

Meanwhile, Leicestershire County Council has recognised the potential value and benefits of anaerobic digestion and is offering support to businesses that would like to evaluate its potential. The council is offering grants of up to £5,000 for a maximum of half the value of an AD feasibility study and is keen to encourage businesses to take up the opportunity. More.

Scottish Councils to Trial Food Waste Collection Schemes

We thought that all AD and Biogas fans would be interested in this item as successful food waste collection would be likely to lead to enhanced implemetation of biogas schemes. The following is from Let's Recycle! News:-

The first of Remade Scotland's food waste trials will begin collections on 25 February, after being delayed last year by the change in Scottish government.

Remade Scotland are managing seven food waste collection trials, lasting one year, following in the footsteps of the Waste & Resources Action Programme's food waste trials in England and Wales (see letsrecycle.com story).

The aim of the trials is to promote better understanding of the effectiveness and economics of different food waste collection systems.

Four of the Scottish trials will focus on collecting food waste only (in Aberdeenshire, East Renfrewshire, Glasgow, Inverclyde) and three of the trials (in Falkirk, North Lanarkshire and Perth and Kinross) will add to existing infrastructure, collecting food waste with the garden waste.

Aberdeenshire: While the majority of the participating councils are due to start trials in March and April, Aberdeenshire will begin its trials in February with 5,000 households in Aberchirder, Banff, Macduff, Whitehills involved in the weekly collections.

All residents will receive a 20 litre bin in addition to a five litre kitchen caddy. Residents will also be provided with a free supply of compostable liners, manufactured by Biobag which come in rolls of six.

The waste will be collected in 7.5 tonne capacity trucks manufactured by Farid and taken to Gray's in-vessel composting facility where it will be composted and used as agricultural fertiliser in the local area.

In preparation for the trials in Aberdeenshire, surveyed 450 households to get an insight into the attitude towards to the forthcoming trials.

David Gunn, assistant campaign manager at Scottish Waste Awareness Group said: "For each of the participating councils, we will do pre-trial and post trial surveys and when all the trials are rolled out we will be collate and analyse the information and submit it to the Scottish Government. We hope to have the report from the pre-trial surveys collaged by the Summer."

All data from the Scottish trials will feed into the data for the UK-wide trials.

Two of the participating local authorities will send their waste to TEG Environmental Plc and four will send their waste to Scottish water's Deerdykes Composting and Organics Recycling Facility - pending award of Pollution Prevention Control Permit being issued by SEPA. 

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

Anaerobic Digestion Projects to get a Boost from Research Showing Up UK’s Huge Food Waste Mountain

The British nation is appallingly wasteful of their food. The UK government has launched a plea for a return to the thrifty approach of previous generations by buying less and eating leftover food.

Each year, the UK dumps 6.7 million tonnes, of food. Furthermore, most of the waste - which nationally costs £8bn to treat or dispose of – is sent to landfill where it rots, potentially emitting the potent climate-change gas methane.

The public must realise that while they are scraping food into the bin they are directly fuelling climate change. Waste food now presents a bigger environmental problem than packaging.

The Waste & Resources Action Programme (WRAP), a government-funded agency that has been investigating food waste, complained that consumers were, in effect, dumping one in three bags of shopping straight in the bin.

In an attempt to change attitudes, Wrap has devised a campaign "Love Food Hate Waste", launched at Borough Market in London yesterday by Ms Ruddock and the TV chefs Ainsley Harriott and Paul Merrett. Wrap's estimate of waste was compiled after polling almost 3,000 households and getting 300 people to keep diaries of what food they threw away. Most waste arose because people had "over-shopped" for a variety of reasons.

This is a Summarised version of a much larger article at The Anaerobic Digestion Community Web Site (Food Waste).

A third of food is thrown away.. Don't Worry Anaerobically Digest it!

The following News is that we are wasting an ever increasing amount of food, as in the following news item:-

British households are throwing away around a third of all the food they buy, amounting to 6.7m tonnes every year.

A third of food bought in the UK goes to waste

This staggering statistic has been released by Government waste body WRAP, which plans to publish a detailed report of its findings at the end of the month.

According to the edited highlights, only half of this food waste would be edible, while the rest comprises of things like bones, vegetable peelings and tea bags.

Nevertheless, this means that for every pound being spent on food around 16p is being wasted.

Your Web Master says: Food waste is an excellent feedstock for anaerobic digestion. OK. Do all you can to minimise food waste, but encourage government to help fund anaerobic digestion plants and this waste food will be used for energy production.