Veolia has been appointed to operate Turkey’s first waste-to-energy plant in Istanbul, the largest in Europe, the French environmental services giant announced Friday.
The plant, built by the municipality, will process about 1.1 million tons of non-recyclable household waste per year, and will produce 560,000 MWh of electricity for 1.4 million people thanks to its three boilers and turbine.
While Turkey gets a large share of its power from gas and coal, the site will save nearly 1.5 million tons of carbon emissions per year, according to Veolia. “The launch of the first waste-to-energy plant in Turkey and the largest in Europe represents a historic step in the sustainable development of our country,” said Özgür Bariskan, deputy general manager of Istac, the waste management company of the Istanbul metropolis, quoted in the Veolia press release.
Istac manages 8 million tons of municipal solid waste per year in Istanbul, with 40 operational units and over 4,000 employees. For Estelle Brachlianoff, Veolia’s managing director, the new plant is “an important step forward in the management of waste and energy in Istanbul”, which will make it possible to avoid the use of landfills.
The contract represents several tens of millions of euros per year, said to AFP the head of the group, which already operates about sixty plants of this type in the world. “And this is not the end of the story” in Turkey, she added, pointing out that Istanbul in particular has other projects of this type and in recycling.
Veolia, the historic leader in water and waste management, is also growing in energy production, a sector that now accounts for €10 billion of its €43 billion in revenue.
