Secretary of State for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs , Hilary Benn, said he was, “very impressed” during a visit to BiogenGreenfinch’s Westwood Anaerobic Digestion plant in Northamptonshire.  The Secretary of State was on a fact-finding mission at the company’s state-of-the-art plant which takes food waste and produces green electricity and bio-fertiliser.

He said, “This is the future.  I am really very impressed with what I have seen.  The future is already happening here.”

Mr. Benn expressed his enthusiasm for BiogenGreenfinch’s Anaerobic Digestion processes. He also said he was delighted with the services provided by the company, in cooperation with local councils and waste management companies, to allow people to separate food waste in their homes for doorstep collection.  He said, “I am very committed to AD.  It seems very obvious that this is the future and BiogenGreenfinch are doing it.”

BiogenGreenfinch, Chief Executive, Richard Barker, said he was delighted to host the visit from the Secretary of State and of having the opportunity to explain the issues facing the green technology industries and Anaerobic Digestion in particular.
 
He said, “We were thrilled Mr. Benn could come to see us today and it was very pleasing to see how genuinely interested and complimentary he was with our Westwood plant.  We explained to him that Anaerobic Digestion is the most environmentally sustainable method of treating food waste. We also discussed how the current negative state of the investment markets was putting a brake on the development of the sector.  This, in turn, could put the Government’s ambitious renewables targets in question.  Mr Benn responded that this is an area the Government is looking at and that the sector could expect some support through the newly proposed Green Investment Bank.”

BiogenGreenfinch’s newest plant at Westwood in Northamptonshire processes 45,000 tonnes of food waste each year to produce enough electricity to power nearly 3,000 homes.  The same amount of food waste will also produce 35,000 tonnes of a rich biofertiliser which is spread onto 1,750 acres of growing crop, with nothing going to waste.
 
AD is a biological process which uses naturally occurring micro organisms in a sealed chamber to break down organic matter into valuable fertiliser and a methane rich biogas which does not, at any time, enter the atmosphere but instead produces renewable energy.