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| For many years May Gurney has been market leader in the design and construction of landfill cells |
The future of waste In this feature May Gurney's Alan Loughlin, Director of Civil Engineering, and John Chick, Director of Geotechnical and Environmental, explain the crucial role May Gurney currently plays in dealing with the nation's refuse - and how the company is at the forefront of the drive to find more sustainable ways to deal with waste.
Have you ever wondered what happens to the 35 million tonnes of domestic rubbish collected from dustbins across the UK every year? And the trade and industrial waste generated by businesses and other organisations?
At present the majority of this waste ends up in large landfill sites, placed there by waste management companies working under contract with local authorities.
"For many years May Gurney has been market leader in the design and construction of landfill cells, the capping of filled cells and associated engineering infrastructure works such as drainage and control of leachate," says John Chick. "We work in partnership with waste operators to ensure the cells are engineered to the highest standards as required by the Environment Agency - to fulfil a mutual responsibility to the environment and to future generations."
As a long-term solution however, landfill is an unsustainable solution for the growing volumes of waste produced by western consumer economies. The EU and individual governments recognise this, and as a result European legislation has been introduced setting local authorities a timetable to reduce volumes of waste going to landfill. By 2005/6, 25% of waste must be recycled - and the figure rises to 30% by 2010 and 33% by 2015.
Failure to meet this timetable will mean substantial fines (£150/tonne) and there is now active dialogue between local authorities and waste operators in pursuit of solutions to the problem.
Domestic recycling
Specialist manufacturers are working, with success, to raise the quality and desirability of goods made from recycled raw materials such as paper, wood, plastic, glass, textiles and even car tyres. The public is more aware than ever of the need to recycle and this has led to the next step into the future of waste.
For the public to be encouraged to recycle on a large scale, clean, dry, user-friendly recycling facilities are required - and May Gurney is heavily involved in the design and construction of new build, and upgrades to, civic amenity sites.
These new generation recycling sites make it easy and comfortable for members of the public to place waste in separate containers - effectively sorting their own waste into recyclable categories, with minimal leftover material to go to landfill.
"These sites are increasingly becoming well-lit, covered, and landscaped - with proper traffic management, litter and odour control," John Chick explains. "The joint vision held by ourselves, the waste operators and local authorities is to make these sites attractive enough for families to use them on their way to the shops - rather than by overalled and gloved people making a special journey in a car lined with old carpets and plastic."
Industrial scale recycling
The next major step forward is to move towards the industrial scale recovery of recyclables and treatment of non-recyclables - and May Gurney's knowledge of the technologies available worldwide is unrivalled. "We have travelled extensively across Europe, the far east and as far as New Zealand, gathering information and forming relationships with high-technology suppliers of waste treatment equipment," says Alan Loughlin.
"We are currently working with clients on the design of a MBT (Mechanical Biologigal Treatment) in Northumberland, and an energy to waste plant in Peterborough. The civil engineering market for all the new waste management facilities required in the UK is in excess of £2 billion, and with May Gurney at the forefront of this market there are great opportunities for us," he adds.
Landfill generates methane, which is piped to and burned in site-based generating stations to feed the local electricity grid. "These small scale operations are dwarfed by the potential of the schemes we are currently engineering for waste management clients," says Alan.
Imagine a large, clean, process plant, where waste arrives in bulk direct from the bin lorries. The waste is deposited in sorting halls where laser technology sorts and bales the recyclables, then channels the residual waste to environmentally clean incinerators where it is burned to generate electricity on a major scale.
Subsidiary plants elsewhere, rather than burning the residual waste, can through composting convert it to inert soil improver or, alternatively, produce compacted pellets to fuel the incinerator in the next town.
All of this exciting technology is available and some of the projects realising this vision are underway. "May Gurney is deeply engaged in the planning, programming and technical development of schemes with waste management companies, and directly with clients," says Alan Loughlin. "We are using our integrated engineering and project management skills to deliver best value to the schemes and to the public."
May Gurney's vision of the future of waste does not stop here. "If landfill is set to decline over the next 10 years our clients will have large land assets that we can help them realise through application of sound engineering skill and imagination," John Chick adds. "There is immense potential to regenerate redundant landfill sites as public amenity space or parkland, leisure areas such as golf courses or even seeded grazing land. And the non-tipped areas of these sites represent possible locations for process plants and even windfarms.
"We are committed to bringing the very best we have to offer to the future of waste, and releasing value from the history of waste," Alan Loughlin concludes.
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A sustainable approach
May Gurney's stated goal of 'Being the best' construction and support services company is accelerating its progress in working with customers to develop more sustainable ways of doing business.
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Recycling & Waste Management 08 (RWM08)
16-18 September
NEC, Birmingham
Stand 952
Click here for more details |
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2007 - an award-winning year more >
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