FCC begins operations at WTE Millerhill facility

Spanish company FCC Environment has announced its Recycling and Energy Recovery Center (RERC), Millerhill, United Kingdom, has reached full operation.

Construction of the new state-of-the-art waste-to-energy facility, which will serve Edinburgh and Midlothian, U.K, began October 2016. The plant has been receiving residential municipal solid waste (MSW) since October 2018, for commissioning purposes, according to a news release.

A milestone was achieved December 2018 with the “generation of energy from the plant’s 13-megawatt turbine."

RERC was developed by Edinburgh and Midlothian councils in partnership with FCC Environment, who signed a 25-year contract to deliver and operate the £142 million plant October 2016.

Constructed on a brownfield site, the plant will treat approximately 135,000 tons of household residual waste and 20,000 tons of household and commercial waste per year, which will generate electricity to power 32,000 homes. In conjunction with the partner councils, district heating proposals are being developed “to take full advantage of the benefits arising from the waste-to-energy process,” the release says.

A separate facility that processes organics collected by the partner councils is in operation at a neighboring site to the RERC. The new facilities will turn organics and nonrecyclable waste into renewable energy, which will “help authorities contribute to the national recycling target of 70 percent by 2025 and the national landfill diversion target of 95 percent by 2025.”

In addition, FCC Environment recently reached commercial and financial close with Danish Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners (CIP) to develop a large waste-to-energy facility in Lostock, England, which will have a capacity to process 600,000 tons per year.

FCC Environmental Services, FCC’s U.S. subsidiary, operates a material recovery facility (MRF) in Houston, Texas, which has also started full operations. The plant has contract to manage the city’s recyclable materials for 20 years. The facility, designed, financed and built by FCC, joins FCC's new recycling plant in Dallas, which has been selected by the National Waste & Recycling Association (NWRA), Washington, as the Best Recycling Facility in North America.