EIB, GIB to provide £183m for waste treatment facility in North Yorkshire

The European Investment Bank (EIB) and the UK Green Investment Bank (GIB) have agreed to provide £183m worth of financing for a new waste treatment facility in North Yorkshire.

Of the total financing, around £150m will be provided by EIB, while the remainder £33m will be funded by GIB.

The project is being developed by North Yorkshire County Council and City of York Council along with AmeyCespa, Aberdeen UK Infrastructure Partners and Equitix.

To be located at Allerton Park, near Knaresborough, the project will feature a mechanical pre-treatment facility to recover metal, paper and plastics for recycling, an anaerobic digestion facility to treat organic waste and produce about 6GWh of renewable energy a year.

Construction of the facility is anticipated to start in December 2014 with operations planned for 2018.

Upon completion, the facility is expected to process about 320,000 tons of household, commercial and industrial waste per year from North Yorkshire and the City of York.

The facility will generate 203GWh of energy annually which will be enough to power more than 40,000 households in the region.

It will divert over 7 million tons of waste from landfill and recover more than 1.5 million tons of recyclable materials.

EIB vice president Jonathan Taylor said: "The European Investment Bank is committed to supporting investment in waste processing that reduces carbon emissions, uses waste to generate green electricity and lowers long-term costs for households.

"We are pleased to support construction of the new Allerton Waste Recovery Park that will use innovative technologies to reduce the cost of waste management for local authorities, increase recycling and recover energy from waste."

UK Green Investment Bank chief executive Shaun Kingsbury said: "This innovative project is a best-in-class example of how local authorities can improve recycling and generate significant amounts of renewable power from household waste."

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Image: The new waste treatment facility will be constructed at Allerton Park, near Knaresborough. Photo: Courtesy of UK Green Investment Bank.