Viridor seeks major zero waste presence in Scotland

United Kingdom-based Viridor says it has created a “vision for a Scottish Circular Economy and Innovation Park” that has attracted the attention of Ivan McKee, Scotland’s minister for Trade, Investment and Innovation.

McKee delivered comments at an online launch event hosted in early July by Viridor, which operates several recycling facilities in Scotland: a glass recycling plant in Newhouse, near Glasgow; what it calls an advanced recycling facility in Bargeddie; an energy recovery facility in Dunba; and the Glasgow Recycling and Renewable Energy Centre operated for Glasgow City Council.

“It is critical that we use the circular economy discussion hosted by Viridor today to create the momentum we need to move beyond ambition, creating the partnerships which will drive our green recovery and deliver on our ambitions for a net-zero economy,” stated McKee.

At the same online event, Viridor says it shared a video message from the U.K.’s Princess Anne, who spoke of her own commitments to recycling. She said she was “delighted” to help launch the Scottish Circular Economy and Innovation Park, calling it “an important and practical demonstration of what should be happening.”

Viridor also presented its Scottish Circular Economy and Innovation Park plan, which it says “brings together energy-intensive recycling and reprocessing plants with facilities that produce the energy required.” Viridor’s energy recovery facilities are combined heat and power plants that use nonrecyclable or difficult to recycle materials as fuel to generate what it calls low-carbon electricity and heat.

Viridor Managing Director Phil Piddington said Viridor is preparing a planning application to East Lothian Council for a plastics reprocessing plant at Dunbar that would draw heat and power from the energy recovery facility.

Stated Piddington, “We recognize [Scotland’s] goals cannot be achieved by any one organization. Success lies in partnering across business, government, academia and inventors to ensure Scottish resources are used and reprocessed in Scotland before being returned to local businesses creating a truly circular economy. These partnerships move us from ambition to the practical reality which delivers real results for the country.”