"The ejector trailers are extremely
Page 39
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
safe, which is one of the reasons I like them so much" Howard Hughes
where it is sorted and stockpiled before being trucked to the sites.
The transfer stations have been running for about 18 months now and are proving an economic and logistical success. Because the total volume of waste being sent to landfill has fallen, individual loads are often quite small and trucking them up to 50 miles to a landfill site is not economic for small waste producers. The transfer stations provide a "remote gateway" to the landfill site.
Sorting is now a vital part of Biffa's operations. Since the Landfill Tax came in, low-grade waste has been taxed at a rate of ,(2. per tonne, whereas active waste is taxed at L7 per tonne and is set to rise to Lio per tonne this October. So it makes sense to separate the active stuff from the low grade.
The waste is taken to the landfill sites in two Dee Warley ejector trailers pulled by MAN tractors. The most recent acquisition is the Dee Warley Taper-jector, winner in the bulk category of the Commercial Motor Trailer of the Year Awards.
Tapered bed
This trailer, which is on long-term hire from Merseyside-based Riverside Truck Rentals, features a revolutionary tapered bed design, which means the skip is approximately 3oomm shallower at the front end than at the rear.
This makes discharging the load considerably easier because it comes away from the sides of the skip as soon as it starts moving. And because the bed slopes away to the rear, gravity also helps in emptying the trailer.
"We always use ejector trailers given the choice," says Hughes. "On a landfill site of course you've got very poor ground conditions, so tippers aren't such a good idea. If the ground's unstable and you raise the tipper body right up, there's always a remote possibility of overturning.
"By comparison, the ejector trailers are extremely safe, which is one of the reasons I like them so much," adds Hughes.
One of the great safety benefits of the Dee Warley Taper-jector is its innovative, one-piece Nevis sheeting system. "The sheeting system is good for two reasons," says Hughes. "From the safety point of view it's good because you don't need someone climbing up on top of the load to fix the sheeting. And it's also labour-saving—it takes only about 30 seconds to sheet the trailer up instead of to minutes."
Indeed, the trailer is operated entirely from one point at ground level. Both Dee Warley trailers are totally self-contained with their own engines, and operating them is only a matter of turning a key and pulling three levers.
Transfer station
The two trailers are based at the Darlaston transfer station but also serve the Stoke one. Darlaston serves three landfill sites; Stoke serves two. The shortest round trip from transfer station to landfill site and back is about zo miles; the furthest is 6o. The two Dee Warley trailers are also kept busy.
"We shift between 35o and 400 tonnes of waste from transfer station to landfill every week," says Hughes.
"Each trailer carries between 16 and 19 tonnes of waste—we're limited by volume, not weight, and as waste is fairly low-density we don't usually achieve our gross maximum weight. Each trailer does about zo loads a week, which adds up to about r,000 miles a week," adds Hughes.
At present the two trailers are working at their optimum level and Biffa is getting good utilisation. Occasionally Hughes has to hire an additional truck (usually a tipper), but he hasn't yet reached the stage of having to get another ejector trailer on contract hire. But that could soon happen.
"We're extending the Stoke transfer station and we're about to open another in Nottingham," says Hughes.
It's quite feasible that Biffa will soon buy its own Taper-jector trailer to accommodate this expansion. The transfer station concept is certainly looking to prove successful—but then everybody knows that where there's muck there's brass.