The New Commingled Materials Reclamation Facility at Norton, Worcestershire
A bit of recent history
In December 1998 Mercia Waste Management was awarded 25 year Integrated Waste Management Contract by Worcestershire County Council and the Herefordshire Council as Waste Disposal Authorities in partnership.
The objectives of the contract have been to safely manage the municipal waste arisings, and introduce a range of new facilities and services aimed at achieving recycling, recovery and landfill diversion targets set out by the Councils, reflecting central government objectives.
With regard to the management of dry recyclables collected at kerbside in the region, by mid 2003 the Company was operating two small Materials Reclamation Facilities (MRFs – say ‘murfs’), at Rotherwas in Hereford, and at Hill and Moor near Pershore. These facilities receive, sort and despatch recyclables from Herefordshire, Malvern Hills, Worcester City and Wychavon, collected weekly in plastic sacks alongside refuse collections. There is an alternate system for recyclables with cans and plastic bottles in Week 1 and paper, card and textiles in Week 2.
The Company also planned a similar MRF to serve the northern districts of Worcestershire; however, planning permission for a unit along with other facilities at Kidderminster was refused on appeal in 2002. At about this time the government proposed new, tougher recycling targets for County and Districts, and made new funding available to the authorities. To achieve these new targets the district authorities in Wyre Forest, Redditch, and Bromsgrove opted for recyclables collections utilising kerbside sorting. In support of this collection regime, the Company commissioned three new reception centres, in Kidderminster, Redditch and Bromsgrove. Material from these facilities is largely despatched direct to reprocessors, although some of the material is diverted for further sorting through the Company’s MRFs.
Across the two counties the various systems for kerbside collection and recyclables management have been largely successful to date, with authorities having either met or come close to achieving statutory targets under Best Value Performance Indicators (BVPI). However, new initiatives are called for if the authorities are to meet the tougher requirements under the Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme.
'The Vision' - Why we need a new facility
In November 2004 the councils in Worcestershire and Herefordshire published a Joint Municipal Waste Management Strategy which set the framework for the management of municipal waste in the region until 2034.
A key element of the Strategy is the implementation of a ‘Vision for Waste Collection’, aimed at:
. Extending the service for kerbside collection of recyclables to every household in the two counties.
. Increasing the overall recycling percentage - to the levels targeted in the Strategy and necessary if the authorities are to meet their latest government targets.
. Reducing the gross cost of residual waste and recyclables collections.
In line with an emerging pattern across the UK, the councils in Worcestershire and Herefordshire intend to adopt a common, simplified strategy of alternate weekly collections for dry recyclables and residual waste. It is proposed that householders deposit dry recyclables – paper, light card, plastic bottles, cans, and glass bottles and jars – commingled in a single receptacle for fortnightly collection.
Projections indicate that by 2028/29 – the end of the current Integrated Waste Management Contract – the quantity of kerbside collected recyclables will be in the region of 105,000 tonnes per year.
The MRFs at Hill and Moor and at Rotherwas have neither the capacity nor the technology suite capable of handling the range and volume of materials projected. A new Commingled Materials Reclamation Facility (CMRF or ‘SeeMurf’) is therefore required to service the new collection regime, to be located at the Area 7 Business Park, Norton-juxta-Kempsey, near Worcester.
Strategic Issues: Why one plant? Why here?
Through investigation of the technologies available to sort commingled recyclables, the Company concluded that a single, strategically located CMRF offers the most effective means of dealing with the arisings, with growth, over the life of the contract.
By way of example, a small/medium-sized system capable of 15 tonnes per hour throughput operating on a basic single shift, five days per week will process 25 – 30,000 tonnes per year. In Herefordshire it is projected that kerbside arisings in 2028/29 will be around 18,000, which would not justify a separate plant in this location. Also, particularly in relation to Herefordshire, much of the material sorted in a plant located in the west of our region, would have to be transported eastwards to the M5 corridor and onwards to reprocessors up and down the country.
Both refuse and recyclables collections are entirely dependent upon road vehicle transport, and it was not considered practicable to seek to develop a transport/transfer system utilising either the rail or river/canal network. However, to minimise road traffic impact the Company chose a site for the new CMRF with the following elements in mind:
1 A location in central Worcestershire that will enable direct delivery of material in collection vehicles, with the shortest possible haulage distance for the districts in closest proximity – Worcester City, Wychavon, and Malvern Hills. Ideally, district collection vehicles should not have to venture more than five miles (8 km) beyond the district boundary.
2 Materials collected by Herefordshire and the northern districts of Worcestershire to deliver into Company owned transfer facilities that are already in operation in these areas, to take advantage of environmental and cost benefits of bulk transport, utilising established permitted and licensed infrastructure.
Local Issues: The Site. The Plant. How does it work and what impact will it have?
The Site
The location of the new CMRF is on the industrial development a site known as Area 7 at Norton, some 4 km southeast of Worcester, on the B4084 at it’s junction with Woodbury Lane. The site has a long history of industrial occupation. The land was previously owned by ceramics manufacturer Morganite Crucible, who retain premises on adjacent land to the south. Part of this brownfield site has been developed with the construction of a large warehouse operated by Arrow Distribution.
The plot for the CMRF is on flat land, levelled for redevelopment. It lies between Woodbury Lane and the main Cheltenham to Birmingham railway line, and the building will sit in the gap between the Arrow Distribution warehouse and the Morganite Crucible works.
The building will be of similar size and height to the Arrow building, with offices and workers facilities incorporated into the elevation that fronts onto Woodbury Lane. The office accommodation will include a classroom/conference room for visitors. We have asked the architects to consider a design to maximise natural light entering the building to save energy, and to incorporate a grey water recycling system for the non-potable water uses.
The building will be set back from the road with car parking and an extensive landscaping belt between the building and the road. A new entrance into the plot will be constructed, details of which have previously been approved in outline – under the earlier permission for B1/B2 uses.
There will be external lighting sufficient to ensure safe manoeuvring of vehicles during the hours of darkness.
The facility will be securely fenced and gated, and all HGVs will be controlled through a weighbridge system.
Inputs
The initial input tonnage will depend upon how many districts have commenced alternate weekly collections. However from Day 1 the plant will be capable of accepting and sorting nominally 60,000 tonnes per year.
The system will be designed to operate up to a capacity of about 30 tonnes per hour. Initially, the site is likely to operate a single shift of 8 hours over a five-day week. Capacity will be raised by operating additional shifts. Normal operating hours will be 06.00 to 22.00 hrs Mondays to Fridays and 07.00 to 13.00 hrs on Saturdays. For full details of the planning permission please click here.
At full operational capacity, the commingled recyclables will arrive in either conventional collection vehicles direct from their collection rounds, or in bulk haulage vehicles from the Company’s outlying transfer facilities. All vehicles will weigh in and proceed to the reception hall inside the main CMRF building. The layout of the plant is designed to ensure that queuing vehicles will not back up onto the public highway.
The reception bays, together with the storage capacity at upstream transfer facilities, will provide storage for two full days’ input in the event of major plant failure.
Materials Sorting
Inside the building vehicles will discharge into the reception bay. There will be no discharge of materials outside the building, nor storage of segregated product outside the building other than in loaded vehicles or containers awaiting despatch.
The sorting system is designed to accept and separate:
. Newspapers, and magazines
. Light card (mainly food packaging containers)
. Dense plastic bottles (PET, HDPE)
. Steel and aluminium cans
. Glass bottles and jars
The system will also incidentally separate aluminium foil, dense cardboard, and any polythene bags encountered in the input materials.
The commingled material will be loaded onto an elevating conveyor and transported into the sorting hall. Firstly, major contraries (things we don’t want, and that have been put in by mistake) will be pulled out, and then the materials will be separated through a series of computer-controlled screens, classifiers and optical sorters. At various stages, and particularly at the end of each line, the material will pass through manual sorting stations for quality control.
Subject to future requirements of the Councils there is capacity to add further sorting capabilities, for example, to segregate different plastic polymers, and items such as tetrapak drinks containers.
Whilst much of the materials separation will be automated, the CMRF will require some 25 operatives per shift, employed in manual sorting, loading (using wheeled loaders, grabs and forklift-type vehicles), maintenance and supervision).
Outputs
Evidence from similar plants in the UK suggests that commingled collections give rise to the following outputs as a percentage of input:
| Paper | 70% |
| Steel cans | 1.5% |
| Aluminium cans | 1.5% |
| Mixed plastic bottles | 5.0% |
| Mixed Glass | 15% |
| Dense cardboard | 1.0% |
| Rejects | 6.0% |
The segregated paper, card, plastic bottles and cans will be baled for despatch on flatbed trailers. Glass and reject material will be discharged into containers for transport off-site. All materials handling, loading and sheeting of containers and despatch vehicles a will take place inside the building.
Environmental control
The doors to the main CMRF building will remain closed except for the reception and despatch of collection and export vehicles. Noisy activities like baling cans and plastic bottles will take place in the enclosed sorting hall.
No raw refuse or noxious material will be delivered to the CMRF, other than through incidental contamination that is not detected (and rejected) by collection crews. The input materials will be largely clean and dry, and the authorities and their contractors will provide on-going education to ensure that input quality is maintained.
Subject to plant selection the mechanical handling plant may give rise to localised dust emissions. It is proposed that these will be controlled by use of fine mist sprays or by localised dust extraction and filtration over specific items of plant. Within the main CMRF building, the majority of manual handling will take place within enclosed cabins, which will be climate controlled and noise insulated. The mechanical separation plant will be located in the sorting hall side of the building, segregated from the reception/despatch hall.
All operatives will be fully trained, and provided with appropriate clothing and safety equipment commensurate with legislation in force at the time. As a waste management facility, the operation will be monitored and controlled by the Environment Agency through a Waste Management Licence.
Traffic
The proposed CMRF will give rise to about 65 HGVs arriving and departing each day, with the majority of HGV movements occurring outside peak hours. A full assessment of the traffic impacts was presented in the Planning Application supporting statement, which concluded that there will be no significant additional impact on the local road network. As well as construction of a new access from Woodbury Lane, the Company will be implementing a range of traffic amelioration measures as agreed with the Highway Authority.
In addition, to reduce the risk of HGVs ‘rat-running’ through local villages, the Company has concluded a legally binding agreement (A ’Section 106 Agreement’) which seeks to restrict vehicles travelling on approved routes only).
Visual Impact
We cannot hide the fact that the CMRF is going to be a big building on an allocated industrial site, so we have asked our architects to give us a design that is more attractive than a big grey box, without being too flamboyant. In addition we propose some extensive landscaping on the frontage of Woodbury Lane.
Ecology
The site for the CMRF is a brownfield plot that has been cleared and levelled for redevelopment, rather than a greenfield site. The development does not pose a threat to any endangered species, nor does it involve the loss of habitat. Conversely have the opportunity to encourage wildlife to get established in the landscaping on the frontage of Woodbury Lane.