Plans lodged to resume some work at fire-ravaged Altens recycling plant in Aberdeen

Plans which would allow work to resume at the fire-ravaged Altens recycling plant have been lodged with Aberdeen City Council.

The proposals from Suez involve building a new group of temporary cabins in the current car park to allow workers to return.

Altens recycling centre was the site where all of Aberdeen City Council’s recycling was sorted, until a massive fire in July last year.

Built in 2017, the £27 million building was “state of the art” and designed to divert 71,000 tonnes of Aberdeen’s waste from landfill every year.

Bosses have said although it’s “impossible to prove conclusively”, they believe a lithium battery device was accidentally recycled and was responsible for the fire.

Will Altens be back up and running?

The planning application outlines a group of eight new cabins for workers, including a canteen, office, lockers, toilets and storage.

Despite the plans allowing workers to return, the site will not be sorting through the recycled materials – which it did before the fire.

It will just be used as a collection point for the council’s waste collection fleet before it will continue to be trucked nearly 300 miles to Hartlepool in County Durham, where it will be sorted until the Altens site is rebuilt.

Due to the site not being used for sorting, many of the workers that were made redundant after the fire will not be getting their jobs back.

Aberdeen City Council says the new proposal would allow the fleet to move out of Kittybrewster, which would “alleviate the pressure” on that facility.

According to the plans, it would just be a temporary measure for a period of six months.

This is to allow for the office and depot buildings, which avoided the worst of the fire, to be assessed for damage.

How important was the Altens site?

When the site was operational, there were 76 full-time employees who sifted through the materials – with around 22 on shift at a single time.

It also had 115 different machines on site to help the team sort the tonnes of waste.

Around 50% of the materials would be recycled after being sorted into 14 different groupings, including aluminium, waste paper and cardboard.

The other 50% would be bundled and sold on the European market where it was burned to make electricity.

Eventually, waste is planned to be burnt at Aberdeen’s own incinerator, which is due to open this summer. The non-recyclable waste of Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire and Moray will continue to be sent to landfill until it fires up.

Only around 1% of the waste taken to Altens ended up in a landfill.

Rebuild still around 11 months away

In October, Suez did apply to the council for permission for a temporary structure on the site which would have allowed for the material to be delivered there.

But these plans were never implemented, with Suez saying this “contingency arrangement” was never required.

In December, the demolition of the site began “carefully”, as recycling firm Suez is keen to try and save as much of the facility as possible.

The demolition is expected to be completed by March. After that has been completed, the rebuilding phase is planned to take around nine months.

The final completion date will depend on how much of the original site can be saved.

Changes have also been included in the new design, including fresh cladding regulations following the Grenfell Tower disaster and better energy efficiency.

The full planning application for the new temporary measures at Altens recycling centre can be seen here.