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East Rockingham Waste to Energy, Australia

In December 2019, John Laing achieved financial close on the East Rockingham Waste to Energy (‘ERWTE’) in Perth, Australia. The facility addresses two major challenges facing Australia: delivering sustainable and affordable solutions for both electricity generation and waste management.

Key statistics

40+ yr operating life

40% John Laing ownership interest

300k tonnes of residual waste processed p.a.

96% diversion from landfill

East Rockingham recent min

East Rockingham recent min
The environmental cost of landfill

Australia disposes of over 23 million tonnes of waste to landfill every year, with Western Australia having the highest waste generation rate per capita coupled with one of the lowest recovery rates in the country. There are significant costs to land, air and water associated with landfill.

Perth is built on a sandy coastal plan that relies heavily on groundwater as its primary source of potable water. As readily accessible landfill sites reach capacity, and with no new metropolitan landfill sites likely to be approved, it is imperative to adopt other solutions to improve waste diversion rates, and increase the recovery of energy available from waste.

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IMG 0205 min.jpg cropped2
Second large Australian facility to reach financial close

The ERWTE is the second large scale Waste-to-Energy facility to achieve financial close in Australia. It will process up to 300,000 tonnes per annum (‘tpa’) of residual waste and is capable of processing an additional 30,000 tpa of bio-solids from the Perth metropolitan area. It will also produce around 70,000 tpa of bottom ash and 12,000 tpa of flue gas treatment residuals.

The bottom ash will be further processed to recover metals and produce an aggregate product that can be used in road base and other construction material applications. This will achieve a 96% diversion from landfill.

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The ERWTE will export 28.9 MW of baseload electricity to the grid, of which over 50 per cent is deemed to be renewable.

It is expected to create around 300 jobs during construction and 40-50 during operation.