Italian company receives approval to build waste-to-energy plant.
The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection has granted Italy-based Entsorga a non-disposal solid waste permit which the company says will allow the company to start construction on a waste-to-energy facility to be built in Martinsburg, West Virginia.
According to press reports the company expects to break ground on the facility by the end of 2014. The project is expected to be completed in 18 months.
The plant will practice a zero-waste concept that dictates that 90 percent of the waste entering the facility will not be transported to a landfill, but instead used for energy. The plant will also use a technology known as high-efficiency biological treatment, or HeBIOT, which organizes incoming waste without the need for employees to sort the waste by hand.
The waste to be used for fuel would be dried out and shredded into a loose, confetti-like material. The organization has an agreement to provide the fuel to the cement company Essroc and has been contacted by several other cement companies interested in replicating the business elsewhere and buy the fuel. The company hopes to replicate the facility at other locations in the United States.
Entsorga will lease nearly 12 acres with the potential to lease an additional 5.65 acres of the Solid Waste Authority's property.
