The UK’s largest energy from waste (EfW) facility has been officially opened by Cory Environmental at Belvedere in Bexley, London. The new Riverside Resource Recovery (RRR) facility plays a crucial role in the integrated waste management solution which Cory Environmental has developed to process London’s waste. The facility will make an important contribution to the capital’s ability to meet its landfill diversion and renewable energy targets for the next 30 years.
The RRR facility will process an average of 585,000 tonnes of non-recyclable residual waste each year, generating 66MW of renewable electricity for export to the National Grid – enough to power around 100,000 homes. RRR is currently not only the largest EfW facility in the UK but also one of the most efficient.
The majority of the waste comes from four London boroughs – Wandsworth, Hammersmith and Fulham, Lambeth and the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea. Cory Environmental also holds contracts with the London Borough of Bexley, the City of London and Westminster City Council, and the facility also takes commercial and industrial waste from the surrounding area.
RRR incorporates a 270m long deep-water jetty, which enables the majority of waste to be delivered by river, removing more than 100,000 lorry movements from the capital’s congested roads each year.
RRR produces around 170,000 tonnes of Incinerator Bottom Ash (IBA) each year. This ash is the principal residue from the incineration process, and is transported by river to Tilbury in Essex where it is used to make aggregate for the construction sector. It is already being used on the M25 widening scheme.