Mícheál Geary, 3NRG Business Development Director, who previously worked with Greenstar, the company which provides waste and recycling services to 60,000 households in Ireland as well as commercial waste services to a further 25,000 businesses, says each element of the Bridgend technology is well-proven.
“The autoclave-mechanical separation stages have run on a small commercial scale at Bridgend,” says Mícheál Geary. “The thermal process is robust and proven in a wide variety of biomass processes. We are not inventing technologies but we are applying existing proven technologies in an innovative combination to the processing of solid municipal waste.
“The 3NRG model is particularly attractive from a business perspective as policy, legislation and fiscal measures are all aimed at diverting waste from landfill throughout the European Union. This process has the least cost, we believe, and can successfully operate at levels of 100,000 tonnes of waste per year. We are looking at a payback period on our investment of just three years,” adds Mr Geary.
3NRG believes that there will always be need for waste processing facilities such as it is to provide and Mr Geary points out that even in countries with a strong recycling culture stretching back 30 to 40 years, a residue of 30 to 40 per cent of waste remains to be processed in other ways.
“Our process sits comfortably with ongoing efforts to maximize recycling through separate collections and ensures maximum recycling and recovery of the residual fraction that remains in the black bin.
“In the UK and Ireland we must urgently move to reduce our reliance on landfill which still accounts for the bulk of waste disposal, totalling more than 30 million tonnes annually,” says Mr Geary. “Plants like Bridgend can also be run on other sources of biomasses, such as woodchip, forest thinnings and sludge.
“We are very excited about this project which we see as the logical next step for FLI Environmental,” says founder, Michael Flynn. “This recycling and recovery of residual waste, diverts solid waste from landfill, is a viable alternative to incineration, can be run on a relatively small scale and produces clean energy at a profit for investors. We believe Bridgend is the way forward and will be the first of many such plants.”
3NRG is an Irish based company and part of the FLI Group. 3NRG uses proven technologies to deliver innovative waste treatment solutions and to generate energy from waste biomass. 3NRG is committed to displacing fossil fuels in electricity and heat generation through the use of waste biomass as a fuel source for thermal processes and from the utilisation of biogas derived from anaerobic digestion. The feedstock for 3NRG processes includes; waste woodchip, sludge, food waste and low grade compost/biomass derived from municipal solid wastes. More information at www.fli.ie ENDS –Monday, January 15, 2009.
Media contact:
Michael Bance, Bance Nolan Ltd.,
30-33 Waterford Business Park, Cork Road, Waterford,
Ireland, telephone 00 – 353 – 51- 845403; on behalf of FLI Environmental, telephone 00 – 353 – 51 – 353190
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