Veolia ANZ and Adbri has signed a new contract. Image: Veolia Australia and New Zealand/LinkedIn
Veolia ANZ has revealed a new contract with Adbri Cement, which will help reduce waste from landfills and create more jobs.
The Veolia ANZ / ResourceCo partnership will deliver more than 1m tonnes of sustainable Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF) from its Adelaide facility to replace natural gas at Adbri Cement’s Birkenhead plant.
Veolia ANZ believed the contract would make its Wilkins Road facility the only one in the country to manufacture and deliver RDF to a domestic company.
Veolia ANZ’s chief operating officer for resource recovery Craig Barker said the contract marks a new era for the Veolia ResourceCo alternative fuel business, which will manage the supply of RDF 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
“This is a genuine circular economy and emissions reduction project that will help South Australia hit its emissions reduction targets and deliver eight new jobs to Adelaide at the same time, bringing our total staff numbers at Wilkins Road up to 64,” Barker said.
“We have calculated that over the course of the contract we will divert about 1.48 million tonnes of waste from landfill.”
Since 2003, AdBri’s Birkenhead plant has been increasingly using alternative fuels to power its manufacturing process, and Veolia ResourceCo’s RDF has played a significant role in this.
Image: Romain P19 – stock.adobe.com
RDF now makes up about 13 per cent of the energy used by the Adbri Group across its entire business, which has seen an eight per cent drop in emissions in 2023 compared to 2022.
In 2023, Adbri obtained approval from the Environment Protection Authority South Australia (EPA SA)to further increase the use of RDF that will divert another 80,000 tonnes of RDF from landfill each year.
“Adbri has pioneered the use of RDF in Australia. Cement manufacturing is energy intensive, and the use of alternative fuels is one of the levers we are using to reduce our emissions as part of our goal of net zero by 2050,” Adbri’s chief operating office for cement and lime Brett Brown said.
“The increase in RDF, approved by the EPA SA in 2023, is estimated to further reduce our greenhouse gas emissions by about 13,000 tonnes annually.
“It also supports our customers in adopting lower carbon products, with our Birkenhead facility proudly producing Australia’s lowest carbon embodied general purpose cement that has been independently verified.”
Refuse Derived Fuel (RDF) is made from largely selected commercial and industrial waste that would otherwise end up in landfill. This waste is processed and re-manufactured into a fuel that can be used for direct combustion in pre-heaters, calciners and rotary kilns, making it ideal for cement manufacture.
By replacing natural gas or coal for high energy consuming industries, the RDF reduces waste to landfill and cuts overall greenhouse gas emissions.
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