Burges Salmon advises Devon County Council on 60,000 tonne exeter energy-from-waste project

19 July 2011

A new £45m energy-from-waste facility which will divert 60,000 tonnes of residual household waste away from landfill each year is to be built following the signing of an agreement between Devon County Council ("DCC") and its waste disposal contractor Viridor. The Energy & Environment team from UK law firm Burges Salmon advised DCC on a modification order to its existing disposal contract.

The new facility will now be built on the site of the former Exeter incinerator on the Marsh Barton Trading Estate. French company TIRU was chosen ahead of three other bidders to develop the facility, which is expected to open in 2014. Once in operation, it is expected to generate three megawatts of electricity per hour for export to the national grid.

Leading this project on behalf of Burges Salmon was senior associate, Nick Churchward and associate Lloyd James supported by multi-disciplinary team including partner Will Gard and director of environmental projects, Nigel Campbell.. The team advised DCC on all aspects of the contract modification and the integration of the new arrangements into the existing service provision as well as ensuring that DCC's interests were protected in the sub-contract arrangements.

Nick says: “The team were very pleased to be able to advise DCC on this key facility, which will complement existing service provision and generate electricity from 60,000 tonnes of waste that would otherwise have been sent to landfill.”

Councillor Roger Croad, the Cabinet Member for Environment and Community at Devon County Council, says: “I am delighted we are going ahead with this facility, which will deal with the remainder of waste after recycling and composting has taken place. This is a robust, safe and clean technology with an established track record, which should give many years of reliable service."

This is the third notable transactions for Burges Salmon’s Environment & Energy team in the last three months. They advised Helius Energy on the Helius CoRDe project which will use whisky distillery by-products to fuel a 7.2 megawatt biomass combined heat and power plant. The Helius deal signed in April shortly followed later that month by New Earth Solutions' Scottish PFI-style waste contract worth around £90 million, which went from preferred bidder to contract signature in just over four months.