Winnipeg seeks bids for cutting-edge recycling facility

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This article was published 29/11/2017 (2880 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

City hall expects to have a state-of-the art recycling processing facility in operation in two years.

A request for proposal (RFP) was recently issued for a service provider to construct a new Winnipeg facility that can process more than 55,000 tonnes of recyclable material per month.

Coun. Brian Mayes, chairman of council’s environment committee, said the proposed facility had been recommended in a consultant’s report, replacing a 15-year-old plant Emterra Environmental has been operating on Henry Avenue since 2002.

“The Emterra plant is an old, outdated facility with a lot of manual sorting,” said Mayes (St. Vital). “The department hopes to see a new facility with more automation.”

Emterra had been handling the bulk of the city’s waste and recycling collection, along with the recycling processing.

Two new firms (GFL and Miller Environmental) recently took over city-wide collections, but Emterra continues to process and handle the recyclables on a contract extended to the end of September 2019.

Moira Geer, director of the Winnipeg water and waste department, said bidders for the project will determine how large the new facility should be, but added it has to handle the current amount of recyclables and anticipate increases during the length of the contract.

Geer said Emterra will be allowed to bid on the project, but the RFP stipulates all the equipment in the proposed plant has to be new, with none of the equipment manufactured prior to 2018.

The new contract will be for 10 years, with options for five, one-year extensions, beginning operation Oct. 1, 2019. According to terms of the RFP, if the plant isn’t operational by October 2019, the winning bidder has to have an alternative in place until the new plant is opened.

The RFP stipulates the new plant must be constructed in Winnipeg.

Emterra’s contract with city hall for the recycling process plant was to expire in September, but was renewed for a two-year term to allow the successful bidder enough time to construct a new facility.

The RFP closes in January. Mayes said the department is expected to bring a recommendation to the committee and council a short time after.

The RFP proposes the service provider will construct, own and operate the new plant, financing the operation based on revenue from the city contract and any other additional contracts it can secure.

The winning bidder will be required to find markets for the material provided by the city’s two recycling collectors and handle all sales on the city’s behalf.

Council agreed to pay Emterra $19.2 million for two years to keep its existing facility operating.

The consultant report said council should expect to pay $10 million annually for the new facility.

Mayes said the city’s annual costs — for the existing Emterra contract and the new facility — will be offset with revenue from Multi-Material Stewardship Manitoba (MMSM), the non-profit, industry-funded agency that operates a province-wide recycling program, buying processed recycled material from municipalities.

An administrative report to council said 80 per cent of the city’s contract with the facility operator will be recovered from MMSM.

A provision of the RFP requires the winning bid to provide an observation room for educational purposes and plant tours.

aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca