Member Article

£85m pyrolysis plant set for construction on Teesside

The development of pioneering new energy plant in the region is drawing high levels of interest from potential suppliers, thanks to one of the key figures behind the project.

At an industry gathering, Richard Tweddle, manager of PYReco addressed members of the Energy and Environmental Industries Forum, to discuss plans for an £85 million pyrolysis plant.

The plant, which will be the first of its kind in Europe will be situated in Wilton on Teesside, and will use innovative technology to deconstruct tyres into their constituent parts, including carbon black, steel, oil and gas.

Richard Tweddle said: “This is a new technology with so much potential and the North East is the ideal place to have the plant because of the region’s facilities, infrastructure, knowledge base and supply chain.

“Pyrolysis is much more than recycling. It processes used tyres, which are currently buried in landfill, incinerated or illegally dumped, to recover all the valuable components which were used in the initial manufacturing process.”

Carbon black will be sold back to tyre manufacturers for new tyres, white the high-tensile steel will also be sold on. The retrieved oil and gas will be used to generate electricity at the Wilton site.

Mr Tweddle continued: “The more people in the industry and the region who know about pyrolysis and the benefits it can bring the better so I am grateful to the EEIF and to Ward Hadaway for the chance to spread the word about the plant.”

The Energy and Environmental Industries Forum is a newly formed network representing the North East’s low carbon environmental goods and services industries, and hopes to enable supply chains and inward investment in the region.

Mark Whitehead, partner and head of the Energy Team at Ward Hadaway, said: “Richard and the team at PYREco have a fantastic vision for the potential of this pyrolysis plant and the process and they are very ambitious about expanding the technology further.

“This is particularly timely since companies now have a legal requirement to employ the most environmentally responsible recycling or disposal route for any waste products – the so-called ‘waste hierarchy’.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .