UK: International recycling and waste management company Suez opened a new solid recovered fuels (SRF) plant in Rugby, UK on 18 September 2015. It will supply the Cemex Rugby cement plant with SRF for the next 25 years.
Suez's SRF plant will convert waste from across Warwickshire, Northamptonshire and the wider Midlands area into Climafuel®. Suez will supply Cemex with 240,000t/yr of Climafuel; 200,000t/yr from its SRF plant in Rugby and 40,000t/yr from its SRF plant in Birmingham.
The Rugby SRF plant was built as part of a 25-year deal between Suez and Cemex that was signed in 2012. Suez leased land opposite Cemex Rugby from Cemex in 2013 and construction of the Euro25m SRF facility began in 2014. The commissioning of the equipment took place earlier in 2015.
The SRF facility can process up to 300,000t/yr of waste. Around 70% of the input material comes from businesses in the region, while the remaining 30% is household waste, much of it originating from Northamptonshire County Council. The majority of the waste would otherwise be destined for landfill, but the SRF process enables Suez to extract recyclable materials, which, processed any other way, would be too contaminated to viably recycle.
"We are very pleased to officially open the Rugby SRF facility and formally mark the start of this long-term partnership between Suez and Cemex," said Jean-Marc Boursier, senior executive vice president of Suez in charge of the recycling and waste recovery division for Europe. "Suez is investing considerably in infrastructure to produce sustainable industrial fuels in the UK. The group now supplies 1.1Mt/yr of SRF worldwide. This solution gives us the ability to extract recyclable materials that would otherwise have been lost. It provides Cemex with a sustainable, long-term alternative to fossil fuels. This inauguration is a symbol of our commitment to the production of renewable energy fuels. Energy derived from SRF offers numerous advantages, because it is renewable, transportable, abundant and economically attractive."
