WASTE
Waste in the park
Already established in Istanbul, a compost turning machine is going to be installed as part
of Cambridgeshire County Council’s £730m waste contract. Tom Freyberg went to site to
find out more about a facility that will also incorporate a £41m MBT plant.
I
An aerial view of Donarbon's waste management park in Cambridgeshire.
n April this year Donarbon
Waste Management of Waterbeach
established itself on the waste
management map by winning
Cambridgeshire County Council’s £730
million, 28-year pFi contract.
Up against the likes of Shanks and the
Waste recycling Group (WrG), it was a
big result for Donarbon and the industry,
demonstrating that a small to medium sized
company can beat the larger players.
“Donarbon was basically in the right
place at the right time with the right proposal
to win the contract,” recalls a modest
Mark Shelton, waste promotions manager
at Donarbon. Set up in 1969 as part of
the Dickerson Group, a sand, gravel and
aggregate extraction company, Donarbon
was originally set up to manage the filling of
worked out quarries.
This was done through skip hire,
collecting inert waste only - mostly
construction and demolition waste and
from small builders. In 2002 the firm won
its first major council contract with the
county council, for the landfilling of residual
waste and composting of kerbside collected
garden waste from four of the five districts:
Cambridge City, South Cambridgeshire, East
Cambridgeshire and Fenland.
The centrepiece of Cambridgeshire’s pFi
contract is a £41m mechanical biological
treatment (MBT) plant, currently being built
by civil engineer firm, BAM Nuttall.
The plant is expected to handle 170,000 The company’s waste management park initial works include the installation of
tonnes of waste per year. is no stranger to waste. Waterbeach has in 5,000 vibro-stone columns.
Currently being constructed on the the past dealt with construction, demolition, BAM nuttall says the structure itself will
Donarbon’s waste management park in commercial and industrial wastes and since consist of an external galvanised steel frame
Waterbeach, the 400-acre site has planning 2001 accepted green waste for composting with internal composite cladding panels.
permission for integrated waste management through an in-vessel composting plant. The external frame design aims to protect
facilities. This, and the fact that the company As principal contractor, nuttall is the structural members from the composting
has worked hard on being a good neighbour responsible for managing the supply chain, process.
with all local councils and residents, has including Austrian-based company, Kelag “Black bag municipal solid waste (MSW)
resulted in no planning permission issues that Umwelttechnik, who will be providing the will be brought to the reception hall of the
have historically proven difficult with other composting process design and machinery facility,” says Adam Bunce, agent for BAM
waste processing plants. (worth 35% of the contract value). nuttall. “Here, shredders will rip open the
36 SuSTAInABle SoluTIonS December/January 2009
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