Plans submitted for a waste facility first for Badenoch and Strathspey
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Plans have been lodged for a first food waste transfer station serving Badenoch and Strathspey
David Ritchie & Sons Ltd have applied for the development at their recycling site at Granish quarry just north of Aviemore.
If the building is approved, it would enable biodegradable and putrescible food waste to be stored for onward transportation to a processing facility in the Central Belt
The Badenoch and Strathspey area is presently exempt from food waste recycling due to its rural nature.
SEPA currently permits food waste to be disposed of with other non-recycled waste at the Highland Council’s Granish landfill site.
But this will have to change by 2025 when a Scottish Government ban on landfilling of biodegradable municipal waste comes into force.
The ban had originally been due to come into place at the start of next year but this has been put back to give councils more time to continue to use the landfill void capacity already developed at various existing sites whilst longer-term strategies to deal with such waste are put in place.
As part of this planning permission was recently granted to extend the life of the municipal landfill tip at Granish to the end of March 2023 and the erection of a waste transfer station building.
GH Johnston Building Consultants Ltd, planning agents for the family firm, state: "The applicant has made enquiries of the Highland Council to ascertain its longer term plans to manage the food and general waste streams they currently collect.
"The council has yet to confirm this. Bearing this in mind and the current business operation run at the applicant’s Granish waste recycling centre, David Ritchie & Sons Ltd has been pro-active in enquiring as to whether SEPA would consider an amendment to the current waste management licence.
"This in turn would permit the provision of a food waste recycling service for business and domestic clients in the local area.
"This would involve the provision of a loading and transportation service only within their licensed site at Granish."
Customers would be provided with 120 litre wheelie bins for food waste and acceptable biodegradable waste such as napkins and paper towels which would be collected by Ritchies on request.
SEPA has agreed in principle to the proposed modification to the current waste management licence for the site at Granish to allow the operation.
The Inverness-based planning agents state: "Given the high level of tourist related activity and employment in this sector there is a greater proportion of hotels, food and drink establishments in Badenoch and Strathspey generating food waste compared to other parts of the Highland Council’s area.
"The applicant therefore wishes to be in a position to deal with food waste safely and securely, having had some considerable thought and planning put in place well in advance of the landfill ban coming into force in 2025."
They have said there has been a good level of interest in the proposed service from existing customers.
The proposed food waste transfer building is to be sited adjacent to an existing larger waste tipping building and will be a large profile steel finished agricultural or industrial type shed constructed on a concrete slab.
It will be rectangular in plan form, 24m long by 16.7m wide.
The building is to have a dark grey or black coloured finish to match existing buildings at the recycling centre.
The Inverness-based planning agents state: "Given the high level of tourist related activity and employment in this sector there is a greater proportion of hotels, food and drink establishments in Badenoch and Strathspey generating food waste compared to other parts of the Highland Council’s area.
"The applicant therefore wishes to be in a position to deal with food waste safely and securely, having had some considerable thought and planning put in place well in advance of the landfill ban coming into force in 2025."
They have said there has been a good level of interest in the proposed service from existing customers.
