Dagenham digester promises London food waste revolution

People who have a conscience about letting uneaten food go to waste will soon be able to sleep a little easier – at least if they live in the London area. That is because the city will soon be served by a state-of-the-art recycling facility just now in the process of being commissioned that will have the capacity to turn 160,000 tonnes per year of waste that would otherwise go to landfill into 14 million cubic metres of biomethane gas that can be fed into the supply grid. According to the company behind the facility, that’s enough to power 12,600 homes for a year.

The facility in question is the new ReFood plant in Dagenham out towards the eastern margin of the city, a smart looking installation of gleaming white buildings and brightly reflective metal piping which represents a total investment in both the land and the actual processing plant of some £32m. It will form the focal point for a citywide collection system of food waste and for larger scale recycling of liquid waste from food-related manufacturing. In the first case the sources of the waste food will generally comprise both restaurants and non-commercial institutions such as hospitals. In the second, likely sources might include, for example, breweries or any drinks manufacturing operation.