Waste Not… Southend Seafront Firms Go Green
Four of Southend’s most iconic tourist attractions; Adventure Island, Sealife Adventure, Sands Bistro and the Three Shells Café have got together with waste contractors Cory Environmental [Municipal Services], and come up with a completely rubbish idea.
From Wednesday 4 April, all their rubbish is collected three times a week and instead of being buried in a landfill site, it is transported to Belvedere in the London Borough of Bexley, to Cory’s state of the art Energy Recovery Plant and converted into electricity.
Speaking about the new initiative Marc Miller, Managing Director of the four venues’ holding company, Stockvale Group, said: “Traditionally all our non-recyclable waste material has gone to landfill sites. However, when Cory said that we could convert that rubbish into power for the national grid, we jumped at the idea. It forms the basis of our desire to reach a complete ‘Zero to Landfill’ status”.
Mr Miller’s colleague, Greg Allen added: “We are hoping to divert our remaining waste collections on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday to Cory’s £500m plant by the end of the month to hit that 100% commitment.”
“We work on the basis that there is an average of 70 kilos of waste in each large, four-wheeled general waste bin,” says Cory Envirnmental’s Simon Branch. “Each tonne of waste processed at our new energy recovery plant creates 640 kilowatt hours of electricity, which is sent back into the National Grid. 26% of the total input weight turns into incinerator bottom ash which is then re-used in the construction industry. Currently, ash from our plant is being used in the M25 road widening scheme.”
