How It Helps

13,000 Tonnes Of Waste Recycled

17,053 Equivalent Cars taken off the road

94% of Waste Diverted from Landfill

14% Contribution to Derbyshire's Renewable Energy Target

16,000 Equivalent Number of Households Electricity Supply

41 Jobs Created Phase 1

10 Wind Turbines Needed to Generate Same Renewable Electricity

£1,000,000 Salaries Into Local Economy Phase 1

39,273 Tonnes of CO2reduced

100+ Total Job Creation

The realities of our dependence on fossil fuels for energy and our unsustainable consumption of the earth’s natural resources has long been understood. However, it is not until recently that they have started to impact on everyday life. No one can miss the increase in costs such as petrol, electricity and gas. These and climate change issues dominate the news headlines wherever you look, and the Government's announcement that £100bn will be spent to tackle climate change and increase renewable energy illustrates the importance. Indeed Derbyshire has it's own target for the production of renewable energy. The Sheepbridge Resource Park will produce 14% of this target.

Each year in the UK we throw away a staggering 70 million tonnes of rubbish. Half of this (circa 39 Million tonnes) is produced by businesses working hard to supply us all with the things we need.

In fact in Derbyshire waste created from businesses totals some 1.512 Million tonnes per annum. Based on forecast rates of production, together with all the domestic waste produced, the landfills in Derbyshire will be full by 2014. What will happen to this waste?

The commercial rubbish thrown away has taken many resources to extract or grow, refine or package and transport for sale in shops. Therefore it is not just the product, packaging or food we have wasted but all the energy used to create the goods in the first place that we need to recover as well.

Put simply we are throwing away the very things that could be recycled to make new products and recover energy that reduces our need to burn coal or other fossil fuels to create electricity. Both these activities combine at the Sheepbridge Resource Park to help us fight global warming by reducing the amount of greenhouse gases we produce.

This inextricable link between energy and waste is the reason behind the concept of Resource Parks. By linking two such important activities - resource recovery and low carbon energy production- the Resource Park is able to offer the community economically sustainable employment. The key benefits of the development are outlined above.