The Eastern Creek plant will divert more than 4.5 million tonnes of waste otherwise destined for landfill over its 25-year life while at the same time producing 60,000 tonnes of compost products and 17,000 megawatt hours of electricity from the by-production of bio-gas each year.
The facility, which will be built by gold miner and engineering company GRD in partnership with the Waste Service of NSW, is also expected to cut greenhouse gas emissions by up to 300,000 tonnes a year.
In a first, the facility has agreed to on-sell emission reduction units equivalent to 1.05 million tonnes of carbon dioxide to energy giant BP over three and half years, which GRD company officials said represented the first greenhouse gas credits to be traded globally as the result of technological change.
