Watch: Council Leader Jenny Laing sees new £27 million Materials Recycling Facility near completion

20 March 2017

This new video shows Council Leader Jenny Laing paying a follow-up visit to to see the latest progress at Aberdeen's £27 million Materials Recycling Facility (MRF) which becomes operational this summer.

The facility in Altens East is part of a huge overall investment which also includes the city's new kerbside mixed recycling service which went live this week.

These vital investments will help Aberdeen meet statutory obligations and the city's own ambitious targets for a Zero Waste Aberdeen. 95% of city waste will be diverted from landfill and used as fuel – reducing our carbon footprint. It will also provide significant savings of around £6M per annum on landfill tax.

The MRF is a ground breaking processing facility that separates all the various recyclable materials that householders put in the new single recycling bin. By using the latest mechanical and optical screening technology, along with trained quality control staff, the facility will produce high quality materials that can be sold directly into reprocessing markets. This approach ensures that the intrinsic value in the recycling materials is retained here in Aberdeen, and at the same time creates employment opportunities in the city.

Construction started in January 2016 and despite being initially hampered by ‘Storm Frank’, the MRF should be complete on schedule and on budget this summer. It will begin to make an enormous contribution to the city’s ability to recycle and recover its waste. Along with the Refuse Derived Fuel plant it will eventually divert 71,000 tonnes of Aberdeen’s waste from landfill every year, helping the city to meet Scottish Government recycling and recovery targets and save residents £6m in landfill tax per year when it begins operations.

The construction of the new facility was done as sustainably as possible and 3,000 tonnes of rock excavated on site has been reused to form the foundations of the building. By the end of the project, more than 27,000 tonnes of soil and aggregate from the site will have been reused.

The new office facility will also have an Energy Efficiency ‘A rating’ and a number of energy efficient techniques have been incorporated into its design, including solar panels. Energy efficient LED lights will be used throughout the site.

During construction the site has employed up to 65 people. A further 40 new, permanent jobs will be created when operations begin in the summer.