New biogas plant now open for business across the northeast

Emerald Biogas has opened its new anaerobic digestion plant in County Durham, UK.

The £8 million (€9 million) facility handles commercial food waste collected from around the area and uses this to generate renewable energy for around 2,000 households per year.

Antony Warren, director of Emerald Biogas, says: 'We are now in the position to accept and process unwanted commercial food waste and employ the latest AD technology to create a valued commodity that will be beneficial to the local business and farming community.'

Resource management minster Dan Rogerson adds: 'Our AD loan fund has helped to support the development of this plant which will treat food waste, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and recycle valuable nutrients back to the land.'

The AD plant can handle card, plastics and other materials associated with supermarket waste and fast food outlets. The heavy duty de-packaging process can handle the more challenging waste streams such as supermarket waste, which is often triple packed. The residual materials are sent to local recycling facilities, further diverting waste from landfill.

Entec Biogas built the plant.

Phase one of the plant will process 50,000 tonnes of the region's food waste and planning permission has already been secured to expand the capacity to four times the current size.