The appointed organisations will collect food waste from places including food centres and schools, and bring the waste to a facility in Ulu Pandan Water Reclamation Plant for treatment.
Channel NewsAsia 24 Aug 15;
SINGAPORE: The National Environment Agency (NEA) on Monday (Aug 24) called a tender to collect and transport food waste to a facility for treatment, as part of a pilot project.
The appointed organisations will collect segregated food waste from areas such as the Clementi region and send it to a facility at Ulu Pandan Water Reclamation Plant. The places where food waste will be collected from include Ngee Ann Polytechnic, National University of Singapore, Pasir Panjang Wholesale Centre and Kranji Camp, said NEA.
The facility can treat up to 40 tonnes of food waste and used water sludge to produce biogas to generate energy. It can generate more biogas when the food waste and used water sludge are processed together, as compared to treating used water sludge alone, said NEA. If the pilot is successful, the process may be implemented at NEA’s future Integrated Waste Management Facility and PUB’s Tuas Water Reclamation Plant.
In addition, the company will be required to work with NEA to engage various premises to implement good practices in food waste segregation and collection, the agency said. The tender closes at 4pm on Oct 5, and the facility is expected to start receiving food waste in the first quarter of 2016.
The amount of food waste generated in Singapore has increased by 48 per cent over the past 10 years and is expected to rise further with a larger population and greater affluence, said NEA. Currently, spent yeast and grains from beer brewing as well as soya bean and bread waste are sold to recyclers to convert to animal feed.
The authorities are also conducting another pilot where stallholders and cleaners can process food waste or leftover food to water or compost using machines placed at hawker centres.
- CNA/xq
