(Photo : Michael Gaida)

For the longest time, landfills have always been the option for Australia. With stories of ancient middens dating back to over 60,000 years in age existing in the country, Australia is the host of the oldest waste sites known to man.

This hazardous practice coupled with the increased tax on landfills has prompted Australia's waste to energy plans to finally take off. Over the past few years. Proper waste management has been implemented in the area resulting in half of their wastes being recycled. However, this means that there is still a good 50% of their waste that is being hauled over to different landfills. The solution is a 400,000-tonne thermal treatment facility which will effectively reduce the waste that the landfills would expect and reduce carbon emission.

Australia's first ever energy plant will be built in Kwinana as announced by Mayor Carol Adams. The construction of the waste-to-energy facility will also be one way to promote Western Australia as a premier place for investment.

With the project being ambitious and critical in nature, several partners are working together to bring forth the success of the project. The co-developers are Macquarie Capital which is a financial investment group based in Australia, and Phoenix Energy, a prominent renewable energy firm. Dutch Infrastructure Fund (DIF) is a co-investor acquiring 60% of the project shares. Acciona, a Spanish sustainable infrastructure firm, has secured a 36-month Engineering, Procurement, and Construction (EPC) contract. Design, core equipment, and technical services for the flue gas treatment, furnace, and boiler of the energy plant will be delivered by Keppel Seghers. Land tenure agreements will be taken care of by MinterEllison, one of the country's top law firms.

Once operating commercially in October 2021, Veolia Australia & New Zealand will be in charge of running the waste-to-energy facility. The company Veolia has other projects in the country, one of which being the Woodland Bioreactor Facility in New South Wales.

Project partner Lee Rossetto emphasized that the energy plant is a momentous step towards the improvement of Australia's waste management. The 10-year project also opens the possibility for a major boost in Western Australia's Economy and, along with it, the promise of an increase in local jobs and employment.

Newly-appointed CEO Frank Smith is optimistic about the energy plant project where private sectors and the government has come together to bring forth a solution that benefits the country and the environment.