Privilege Finance, one of the dedicated, specialist Finance Arrangers to Prestige Funds, is leading a GBP17 million project in Attleborough, Norfolk, UK which will see the town become one of the first to be supplied mainly with green gas.
The landmark green energy infrastructure project will see 100,000 tonnes of food waste collected from local households and business and processed by an anaerobic digestion plant. This will produce green gas for 4,000 homes in Attleborough.
The project includes the financing of four digestion tanks, a food waste reception hall and depackaging unit, plus a gas upgrader. Construction is anticipated to be completed in March 2022. The upgraded AD plant will produce up to 1,000 cubic metres of green gas per hour.
The project is being used to prove the concept of a sustainable circular waste-to-energy economy while also reducing the carbon footprint. The project is breaking new ground in the clean energy sector, as it will see green gas piped directly into homes and businesses that are generating food waste.
It is being financed using some of the direct lending capital from several Prestige Funds including Prime Alternative Finance which is focused specifically on direct lending within the UK agricultural economy and with a bias towards impact lending within clean energy infrastructure.
“The Attleborough project is a large-scale example of what we are now regularly achieving through direct lending activity in the UK,” says Craig Reeves, founder of Prestige group. “Projects like these demonstrate the material progress our strategy is already making in reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the UK. Our investors are already seeing capital making a measurable benefit in the battle against climate change.”
“It’s a true closed loop,” comments Marc Graham, Project Development Manager at Privilege Finance. “This is unique because a typical gas infrastructure would mean household gas would come from a mix of resources, but in this instance local home and business owners will be able to trace the gas production back to a renewable energy generation source.”
Methane produced from food waste and other sources is a greenhouse gas which is 28-34 times more powerful than CO2, according to the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe.
According to the Waste & Resources Action Programme (WRAP), inedible food waste from UK households and businesses is around 2.85 million tonnes and is associated with more than 75 million tonnes of GHG emissions.
The plant at Attleborough is a clear example of how GHG emissions can be reduced through the recycling of food waste and the capturing of the methane within the digester for processing into green gas.
Further carbon emissions savings are made by the project because all the Norfolk food waste collections are being made inside the county, reducing unnecessary waste miles associated with transporting it long distances across the country.
