New Energy Corporation has furthered its bid to build a waste-to-energy plant in Rockingham by securing its first waste supply contract.
New Energy Corporation has furthered its bid to build a waste-to-energy plant in Rockingham by securing its first waste supply contract.
Fellow Perth company Instant Waste Management has agreed to supply New Energy Corporation with residual waste from its materials recovery facility in Bayswater.
The waste would be transported to New Energy’s proposed plant - to be built in East Rockingham at a cost of $150 million.
Instant Waste’s materials recovery facility opened in February this year and has the potential to process 200,000 tonnes of waste annually, with 95 per cent being diverted away from landfill.
Instant Waste Management owners Sam Mangione and Tom Mangione have interests in New Energy through their roles as co-founders and non-executive directors.
Meanwhile, New Energy’s other co-founder and chairman is Enzo Gullotti, the man behind Global Construction Services.
New Energy general manager Jason Pugh told Business News the waste supply contract strengthened the company’s bid for investment, which it was pursuing from a range of private investors including infrastructure-focused equity funds and Australian banks.
The agreement with Instant Waste would account for only a small percentage of waste going to the Rockingham site, and Mr Pugh said the remaining feedstock would come from other sources, such as metropolitan solid waste.
New Energy is also in the final stages of signing up an engineering company capable of constructing the facility, and expected to be able to make a decision early in the New Year.
Mr Pugh said while the final three contenders included a Western Australian company, an American company which had experience building waste-to-energy plants was an attractive option.
The Environmental Protection Authority gave New Energy the green light for its other major project - a waste-to-energy plant in Port Hedland - earlier this year.
Mr Pugh said it was touch-and-go as to which project would get off the ground first, but expectations were for both to be in operation by 2016.
New Energy is currently carrying out community consultation on the Rockingham plant before submitting its application to the EPA for approval.
Both plants will be capable of processing around 200,000 tonnes of waste per year and generate 18 megawatts of power.
The Port Hedland facility would be more expensive to build at $184 million, which Mr Pugh said was simply due to “the Pilbara factor” with construction and operation being more expensive.
