Viridor has selected Turner & Townsend to support the installation of carbon capture, utilisation, and storage (CCUS) technology at its Energy from Waste facility at Runcorn.

The firm will provide Project Management Consultant (PMC) services for the project, where new CCUS technology will be retrofitted and integrated to the existing fully operational site in the North West of England. CCUS is an essential part of the UK Government’s 10-point plan for a green industrial revolution supporting green jobs and accelerating the path to net zero.

The capital delivery programme will also lay the groundwork to integrate the facility with the HyNet North West low carbon and hydrogen energy cluster. HyNet will enable the carbon dioxide captured at Runcorn to be transported and permanently stored offshore in depleted Liverpool Bay gas fields. Hynet, is one of the two industrial cluster schemes to receive Track 1 status for CCUS as part of the UK Government’s industrial decarbonisation challenge.


The new contract will deliver project management, project controls and contract and procurement services. Working collaboratively with an industry-leading team of consultants for engineering, CCUS technology, legal, planning, permitting, and economic modelling, the aim of the initial phase will be to develop the Phase 2 submission as part of the Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy (BEIS) industrial decarbonisation challenge fund.

Runcorn is at the foundation of Viridor's decarbonisation strategy to achieve net zero emissions by 2040, and the ambition to be the first net negative emissions waste and recycling company in the UK by 2045. Developing modular CCUS plants on another five EfW sites combined with two planned bespoke CCUS plants would deliver c.1.5 MT CO2 savings a year. This investment would also create around 1,000 construction jobs and up to 180 skilled green jobs in Scotland, Wales, and the English regions.