Recycling Diaries...
In the latest installment of Andrew Hewitt’s regular diary offering readers advice and guidance learned as SB Waste in Wolverhampton progresses through a major project updating its skip waste operations, we find a lot of nail-biting as the firm is let down by a supplier constructing a cabin for its picking station while £650,000 of plant sits waiting to be utilised in the yard.
In the last issue we had got to the point where there were one or two major suppliers still to be decided on. We knew exactly what we wanted to do and how we were going to go about it, the only thing left was to chose who was going to do it for us.
The biggest decision was who we were going to use for the conveyors, electrics and installation work, and herein lie many pitfalls.
The greatest problem in a project like this is making the thing work. OK, I know it sounds stupid and even stating the obvious but with each plant you build like this you have a unique set of circumstances.
After many months of being bombarded with proposals from numerous companies we at SB went down the road of “D-I-Y” for two main reasons.
Firstly, the D-I-Y option allowed us to get exactly what we wanted by cherry-picking equipment from various suppliers. Secondly, and very importantly, it allowed us to save money – some of the quotations we received were well over £100,000.
Of course, the downside is that it becomes your responsibility to make sure the sparkling new £1million plant works when it is switched on – a situation that can cause a few sleepless nights.
As I mentioned last issue we have a Finger Screen and Dense-out de-stoner from Action (see box top right), a Starscreen from Pearson, magnets from Master Magnets, a Haas Shredder from the Machine Shop and a picking station.
They are all currently sat in the yard. Around the best part of £650,000 just waiting to be utilised. However, they will all be worth peanuts unless they are built into a system correctly. Each supplier’s equipment is tried and tested and proven to be effective but will only work to its best abilities when installed and fed correctly.
The last thing you need when commissioning your new plant is to have Pearson saying the star screen’s not working because it is not being fed properly or Action telling you that the Dense-out is not separating the lights from the heavies because it is at the wrong angle or the blower fan is too far away from the plant. You get the idea.
When you start to go into it, the elements that need to be spot on as the waste material moves through the plant are huge in number. It is easy to see the fine line there is between a really good plant and an also ran. It is like having all the money available you need to buy the best players, but still needing that something extra to win the Premiership.
This is where your conveyor supplier comes in. We went back to Orthos Projects at Market Harborough but there are a number of good companies who will undertake this work – FTL put in an excellent plan but Orthos won the day.
This will be the third major project I have undertaken with Orthos in two years and on the first two everything went very smoothly. The conveyors are strong, well designed and well built. The guys know their stuff and communication with their counterparts from major component suppliers is never a problem.
Once you have made your decision on the sizes, angles and speeds of the conveyors you need, the fine details of access for maintenance, cleaning and greasing have to be sorted out. The guards and safety equipment have to be to the highest standard available and everybody needs to agree on who is responsible for what. Then you’re ready to start manufacturing.
Most people in the skip waste business are self-made and have built the business on the back of their own hard work. Steve Broadley at SB Waste is no exception. So controlling the costs and getting the best value for money possible is of huge importance.
Probably the hardest part of the whole process of building one of these plants is the wait between parting with the deposits and the machinery starting to arrive. It can be up to three months and there must be a great deal of trust between everybody involved.
All concerned need to know that things can change at the drop of a hat. So far with this plant we have been reasonably lucky but as time goes on and more and more information becomes available it’s inevitable that some of our original ideas will become impractical.
Already we are changing plans. It was our intention to build all the bays for product collection with steel frames and then construct the walls with pre-cast concrete panels.
However, when accurate measurements were taken it was clear that the surface of the yard we had to work on was nowhere near level enough for this type of construction.
We sprung into action with plan “B”. Once the steel framework has been built we are now going to shutter off the frame and pour the concrete into the walls. It’s a little more work but actually should work out at much the same price and a little stronger than the pre-cast sections.
A major hurdle in any project is being let down by suppliers. And we found out at the 11th hour – deposit cheque already written out – that the supplier of the cabin to go over the picking station would not be able to meet our delivery requirements.
This is a high hurdle for us to jump over as everyone else we have contacted is a great deal more expensive.
Effectively we’ve lost two months on this item through no fault of our own. It looks now as if we are going to have to buy the materials and build it ourselves!
One thing I haven’t mentioned before is power supply. It’s easy enough to have an educated guess at what is required on start-up and full capacity operation, but it is not so easy to get it to where it needs to be.
If your site doesn’t have the electrical capacity required then you have to get it from somewhere. At SB we have a sub-station next door so we’re OK. The problem seems to be getting connected to it. It is one of those jobs that apparently can’t be rushed.
The average time between applying for a mains connection for 500kW+ is six to nine months. If you’re working on a time scale of three to four months between deciding what you want and the machinery being built, unless the power is already on site alternative arrangements will have to be made. Be warned!
We are going to start with a gen-set because there are a couple of advantages. Firstly, you know the exact power requirements before you are connected to the mains so there’s no chance of grossly over estimating your needs and end up paying for something you will never use, or vice-versa and not having enough power for any additional equipment.
Also, you’re not in a position where you are in the hands of the power company before you can start the plant and should you want to add to your plant it is not hard to get a bigger gen-set.
Our plan is to add a couple of balers to the plant in the new year, and perhaps a Rubblemaster if there’s a profitable market for crushed concrete. So it’s always best to remain as flexible as possible with the power supply.
During the first few weeks of operation we will monitor running costs and I’ve a sneaking suspicion that if we can pick up a good secondhand generator at the right price it might work out cheaper than mains power.
Something else to be considered in the power department is the electrical control panel and wiring. There are a wide range of options available and we have plumped for the middle of the road specification. It’ll do everything we need but is not over complicated and as such not ridiculously expensive. I’m a great believer in not over complicating things for the sake of it.
From experience we have found that 80% of any teething troubles these plants have when they are first switched on are silly little electrical problems. That’s why I would always try to use a local electrician to wire up the plant.
The main advantage of this strategy is that when during the first four or five weeks of operation these silly little electrical problems occur the electrician is half an hour down the road. He can easily call in and fix it in five minutes.
Another major point in today’s regulatory framework is noise and dust. As the SB site is in the centre of Wolverhampton it was the boomerang issue in obtaining planning permission.
Noise can be engineered out of the plant. Firstly you have to set standards to work to. Each individual item on the plant will have been tested and noise figures will be available so sound deadening panels and silencers can be fitted if required.
The screen is quiet by nature of its operation so we only really have to worry about the blower and Dense-out fans and there are factory built sound-deadening kits for these items.
But it is the dust that can cause real problems as it is an unknown quantity. And if we are facing hotter summers as global warming experts say we are then it can only become a bigger problem.
We are looking at the Mist-Air system with a sprinkler over the tipping area and dust suppression over the finger screen, the star screen, the Dense-out and the lights blower. It seems to be a very good system if a little expensive.
The only other alternative would be to go to a completely closed re-circulating system on the air separation units but that would still leave the screens and the tipping area to deal with and would be considerably more expensive. So I think it will be money well spent – mind you, it might not seem it when for six months of the year each skip is coming in with 25 gallons of rain water in it!
So as you can see, we are working through all the different areas of the plant making sure everything is progressing as smoothly as possible. By the next issue we should have the drawing for all the civil work and be ready to start on some of the concreting. So I will tell you more about that then.
In the meantime, the old Viper plant we have will be on the way to a refit and a move to our West Bromwich site. I will be keeping myself busy with all the CDM regulations and Health and Safety Planning.
Andrew: 07773 715882