Four Ashes EfW (Staffordshire ERF) (W2R)

An EfW facility based upon conventional combustion technology and considered an ERF based on its R1 status. Located in Staffordshire in the West Midlands of England, the Four Ashes EfW has a permitted operational capacity of 340,000 tonnes per annum, producing up to 29 MW that supplies the EfW's own energy needs, exporting the rest to the grid (23 MW). The facility is owned and operated by Veolia. Feedstock for the facility is primarily locally sourced residual Household Waste, with the delivery method being through road transport.

Four Ashes EfW (Staffordshire ERF) (W2R) Operational
Site Location See Residual EfW → page for a larger UK Wide map.
Waste Licence	HP3431HK
Operator	Veolia
Region	West Midlands
Operational Capacity	340ktpa
Is site R1?	Yes
When was R1 Granted?	2013-10-25
What was the R1 value	0.73
Electrical Capacity	39.00MWe
Number of Lines	2
Number of Turbines	1
CHP	No
Technology Approach	EfW Incineration
Funding Type	PFI

Operators Annual Report

Input Data

Year	HH	C&I	Clin	RDF	Total
2016	307743.00	32203.00	0.00	0.00	339946.00
2017	303968.00	33733.00	0.00	0.00	337701.00
2018	313866.00	22583.00	0.00	0.00	336449.00
2019	336725.00	432.00	135.00	69.00	337361.00
2020	335621.00	313.00	0.00	245.00	336179.00
2021	329562.00	241.00	29.00	0.00	329832.00
2022	277952.00	26423.00	1.00	33679.00	338055.00

Output Data

Year	IBA	IBA %ge of Tot IN	APC	APC %ge of Tot IN
2016	69028.00	20.31%	8698.00	2.56%
2017	66518.00	19.70%	8267.00	2.45%
2018	65857.00	19.57%	8227.00	2.45%
2019	63613.00	18.86%	8640.00	2.56%
2020	64617.00	19.22%	7530.00	2.24%
2021	64882.00	19.67%	8038.00	2.44%
2022	64678.00	19.13%	7889.00	2.33%

Four Ashes EfW. Veolia, 2020.

Summary

An EfW facility based upon conventional combustion technology and considered an ERF based on its R1 status. Located in Staffordshire in the West Midlands of England, the Four Ashes EfW has a permitted operational capacity of 340,000 tonnes per annum, producing up to 29 MW that supplies the EfW's own energy needs, exporting the rest to the grid (23 MW). The facility is owned and operated by Veolia. Feedstock for the facility is primarily locally sourced residual Household Waste, with the delivery method being through road transport.

History

Veolia received planning permission to build the facility at Four Ashes in February 2011 after modifying its proposals to include a smaller chimney stack and lower roof. Construction of the plant began in August 2011, leading to the official opening, carried out by HRH The Duke of Gloucester KG GCVO, and commencement of operations of the facility taking place on Wednesday 14th May 2014.

In December 2014 Veolia seeked permission from Staffordshire County Council’s Planning Authority to increase the tonnage of waste that is delivered to the Four Ashes site from 300,000 to 340,000 tonnes per annum.

Plant

This facility was developed under a 25 year Public Finance Initiative (PFI) contract worth £1 billion for residual waste treatment and disposal, signed by Staffordshire County Council in July 2010 it was the biggest in Staffordshire County Council’s history.

The facility has been built with technologies developed by Veolia in partnership with CNIM Clugston Staffordshire Ltd, with the EPC work carried out by CNIM. The combustion technology comprises of two 20 t/h incineration lines of the CNIM/Martin GmbH reverse-acting grate system with two lines, a CNIM-designed horizontal boiler and a SecoLAB© flue ash treatment system supplied by LAB, a Group CNIM company.

Local Authority Data

The table below lists those local authorities who have recorded their tonnage on WasteDataFlow as sending their Waste to this site (either directly or via a transfer station) for the most recent financial year, data was updated on 2023-04-26. The tonnage received cannot be directly compared with the stated historical tonnage received and recorded in the EA statistics as these are recorded on a calendar year basis (i.e. January 2018 to December 2018). The total Local Authority waste received by the plant in the period was: 271,039.61t

A 'zero return' or a below expected return, when compared to the EA Data below indicates that either:

• no local authority tonnage was recorded/no tonnage was sent to the site in the period (but has been listed as it may have previously received tonnage from a local authority) or
• a result of the plant being recently commissioned and actually having received no tonnage or
• a lower than expected tonnage maybe a result of a local authority splitting their tonnage over multiple sites, having less tonnage to send than might be anticipated or
• it may be a new plant being in 'ramp up' towards full capacity after construction or
• may be a result of plant shut down and subsequent re-start in a year or
• the local authority may not have correctly entered the site's details on WasteDataFlow

Authority	Tonnage
Birmingham City Council	1942.940
Caerphilly CBC	100.760
Norfolk County Council	146.140
Sandwell MBC	58396.890
Shropshire	2327.580
Staffordshire County Council	142803.280
Telford and Wrekin Council	1113.700
Walsall MBC	64208.320

Waste Tonnage, By Origin

The table shows a list of the Waste for the Permit HP3431HK, that has arrived into sites as reported to the Regulator and then publicised in their reported statistics. The Data was last updated on October 2023. The total reported tonnage arriving at the site was: 338,056.57t. Where this tonnage exceeds that reported in year of the corresponding annual report, this may be due to the following reasons:

• Tonnage may have been received but not incinerated, i.e. the material is held pending incineration (the operator return to the EA reports as received whereas the annual report focuses on when the waste is incinerated.)
• Material may have been received into the site but treated in some other way than incineration.
• Material may have been received on the but transferred out of site for disposal/treatment at another site rather than incineration on the site.

EWC Code	Origin of Waste	Tonnes In
20 03 01	Newcastle-under-Lyme	7.18
20 03 01	Telford and Wrekin	1589.96
20 03 01	Stafford	11764.36
20 03 01	Stoke-on-Trent	14651.86
20 03 01	Lichfield	10589.22
20 03 01	East Staffordshire	17441.82
20 03 01	Sandwell	52335.80
20 03 03	Lichfield	693.42
20 03 03	Stafford	532.74
20 03 01	Rugby	3644.64
20 03 01	Birmingham	7948.25
20 03 07	Sandwell	3510.12
20 03 01	Babergh	0.56
20 03 01	South Staffordshire	23603.45
20 03 01	Stroud	24.72
20 03 07	North Warwickshire	947.28
20 03 07	Cannock Chase	4519.00
19 12 12	Birmingham	9.46
20 03 01	Tamworth	292.14
18 01 04	Stafford	0.10
20 03 01	King's Lynn and West Norfolk	24.12
20 03 07	Stafford	4209.86
18 01 04	Walsall	1.32
20 03 07	South Staffordshire	2195.98
20 03 07	East Staffordshire	1804.86
20 03 07	Newcastle-under-Lyme	493.63
20 03 01	Shropshire	1400.04
20 03 01	North Warwickshire	66491.38
20 03 01	Derby	3344.12
20 03 01	Nottingham	178.26
20 03 01	Walsall	62480.49
20 03 01	North Yorkshire	23.28
20 03 03	South Staffordshire	356.58
20 03 01	North Tyneside	23.28
20 03 07	Walsall	2349.82
20 03 07	Staffordshire Moorlands	1427.78
20 03 07	Lichfield	1998.44
20 03 01	Staffordshire Moorlands	9734.36
20 03 03	Cannock Chase	285.54
20 03 01	Cannock Chase	25122.27
20 03 03	Stoke-on-Trent	5.08