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Councillors and committees

Agenda item

Contracts Update

Report attached

Minutes:

The Committee received a report on the current position regarding the Residual Waste Treatment Contract and other contracts and activities managed by the Partnership.

 

Gateshead and South Tyneside Councils’ are in a 48 month Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) contract with Palm Recycling Ltd which commenced in April 2014. Sunderland Council has a separate MRF contract with J&B Recycling for 36 months which commenced 1 April 2015. 

 

Three separate Green Waste Composting contracts have been awarded; Gateshead with A Willey and South Tyneside with Suez, both for 36 months from 1 April 2016 and Sunderland with JBT for 31 months with effect from 1 September 2016.

 

In terms of the Residual Waste Treatment Contract the 2014/15 and 2015/16 reconciliation exercises are nearing completion and latest performance figures were provided.

 

The turbine at the EfW facility has not been operational since September 2016 and has been sent to Austria for repair. It is expected that this will be returned by March 2017, this has impacted on turbine availability which has dropped to 74%, although all residual waste is still being treated. The Residual Waste Treatment Contract is currently over achieving in terms of recycling and recovery performance from April to October 2016, there has also been 100% landfill diversion rate.

 

It was reported that actions to discharge two minor planning conditions at Campground Waste Transfer Station (WTS) have been progressed around noise monitoring assessments and recording of vehicles using the emergency road. Also, there have been minor outages due to blockages in the bottom ash chute, however no time was lost to the contract and there were no major issues during shutdown.

 

It was noted that employee levels remain stable, 40% of the posts at the EfW facility and 70% of the posts in the WTS are from the Partnership area.

 

Community Liaison Groups continue to be held with the Jack Crawford House group meeting on 22 September 2016 who expressed an interest in visiting SUEZ’s new EfW plant at Wilton to see the rail links.

 

In terms of MRF contracts, feedback has been received from health and safety advisors around operational procedures at Riverdale, which have now been amended to enhance safety. This is used by Gateshead and South Tyneside vehicles.

 

Performance around HWRC and blue bin tonnage were provided.

 

The position with regards to the turbine was questioned. It was confirmed that the electrical winding unit will be replaced and there is confidence this will repair the problem. It was felt easier to remove and reinstall the turbine instead of attempting a repair on site.

 

The Committee requested more context in relation to personal injuries and near misses, to be included in the next report. It was acknowledged that Suez pride themselves on health and safety and therefore report everything, which can be very minor. It was also noted that a lot of the incidents occur during the shutdown period when there are high numbers of sub contractors onsite.

 

RESOLVED    -           That the Joint Executive Committee noted the progress of the

project.

 

 

 

 

Supporting documents:

 

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