Investment pays off at a pioneering Material Recovery Facility (MRF)

Overview

Greenstar’s Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) at Aldridge, just north of Birmingham, is one of Europe’s largest – and most advanced. Substantial investment in automation and continual improvement enables the plant to produce top quality material outputs from recyclables supplied in both co-mingled and source-segregated streams.

Commissioned in May 2008 at a cost of £7 million by waste management firm Greenstar Environmental, the Aldridge MRF is housed in a 13,000 m2 former steelworks building. The facility runs 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and with a licensed annual throughput capacity of 300,000 tonnes it is among the largest in Europe.

The MRF was installed and equipped by Dutch engineering company Bollegraaf and boasts automated and manual sorting processes designed to handle recyclates which have been partially separated at the kerbside or are fully co-mingled. Aldridge also accepts glass in the co-mingled input stream while producing paper of a quality marketable to leading paper mills both in the UK and abroad.

For us, this flexibility is important. We accept all the common dry household recyclates – regardless of how local authorities choose to collect them. This gives us the widest possible customer base. Right now, Aldridge is taking material from 15 different councils, as well as from commercial and industrial customers.

Mick Davis, Greenstar’s Director for Processing