UK company Chinook Sciences wins UAE deal with a total value of over £300 million
850 jobs created or secured throughout UK supply chain by Chinook’s continuing success.
An estimated 850 UK jobs will be created or secured at Chinook Sciences and its UK supply chain by recent new orders, significantly accelerated by winning a major infrastructure deal from the UAE.
Trade Minister Lord Livingston made the announcement today (23 May 2014) on a visit to the company’s Nottingham headquarters.
The deal to build the world’s largest advanced thermal energy-from-waste facility in the Emirate of Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates will be worth over £300 million. It was awarded by Bee’ah, the Middle East’s leading environmental and waste management company after Chinook Sciences were introduced to the firm by UK Trade and Investment.
The deal is set to benefit Chinook’s UK supplier base of 440 companies, which supply over 92% of Chinook’s technology and represent every region of the UK.
The Sharjah deal and other orders within Chinook’s pipeline of projects are estimated to create 200 new UK jobs over the next 2 years, and secure a further 650. About half of these new jobs will be in the East Midlands
It is the first major deal for a medium sized business since Lord Livingston announced a new programme of UKTI tailored export support for the 9,000 medium sized businesses in the UK. The government’s industrial strategy is giving business the confidence to invest, creating more high-skilled, long-term jobs in the UK.
Key suppliers expect their revenues to more than double over the next few years as a result of Chinook’s projects, with a substantial addition of new jobs. This ongoing success is also supporting a number of apprenticeship programmes.
Trade and Investment Minister Lord Livingston said:
“Our medium-sized businesses have the potential to be economic powerhouses for the UK. Their success is dependant on expanding beyond domestic markets. Chinook Sciences is a great example of a company doing just that.
“UKTI is delighted to have helped deliver this deal. UAE’s investment will enable Chinook to create new jobs across the UK.”
Chinook has designed the entire facility and is co-ordinating the manufacture, shipping, installation, construction and commissioning of the plant. The deal will lead to the expansion of the Chinook’s manufacturing, research and training facilities at Nottingham Energy Park in Bulwell.
Discussing the significance of the project, Dr Rifat Chalabi, Chinook Sciences’ Group Chairman and CEO said:
“We are delighted to have been selected as Bee’ah’s partner. The Sharjah Project is a major milestone for Chinook Sciences as it means we are now building the world’s largest household waste gasification plant in partnership with one of the most visionary companies in the sector. This is further validation of our market-leading technology and project delivery capability.”
He continued:
“We are very grateful to UK Export Finance which has helped us over a number of years. Lord Livingston’s presence today continues UK Trade and Investment’s support for this project that began when we were selected to be show-cased as a leading UK clean-tech company at its Green Technology Roadshow back in February 2013 where we first met Bee’ah.”
Commenting on its approach to technology selection, Bee’ah’s CEO, Khaled Al Huraimel, said:
“There are many technologies and many companies which have used incineration for years. Sharjah wants to be a leader in the environmental industry, so we went and looked for the latest technology. This technology is the greenest when it comes to waste-to-energy and we felt that this solution was right for Sharjah.”
Ian Harrison, Regional Director for UKTI East Midlands said:
“This major contract win provides a tremendous opportunity for Chinook and confirms the company’s place at the cutting edge of renewable technologies. It will expand Chinook’s business enormously as well as showcasing the region and Nottingham as a centre of high tech expertise and is great news for our local economy.
“Moreover, it demonstrates that exporting is vital for growth. I would urge any business which wants to expand overseas to speak to someone from UKTI, to help maximise and develop business opportunities across the world. Chinook’s success clearly demonstrates how rewarding this can be”.
Notes to Editors
- Chinook Sciences was formed in 1998 with the first operating plant delivered in 2000, which is still working today. Chinook’s clean technology is now in its ninth design generation and has an unrivalled 14 year track record of industrial operation, with an unblemished environmental record in the 16 installations that have been commissioned worldwide to date.
- since its inception, Chinook has continuously reinvested its profits in research and development, securing more than 100 patents, which constitutes one of the most substantial bodies of Intellectual Property in the clean-tech sector. Over £15 million has been invested in research and development in the last 3 years alone. Through this continuous innovation, Chinook has enjoyed significant commercial success, with strongly increasing sales and profits, creating highly attractive investment opportunities for partners in Chinook Energy plants. Chinook’s achievements have recently been recognised with the Queen’s Award for Enterprise in Innovation, the UK’s highest accolade for business success.
- Chinook’s technology and unique process recovers valuable materials, including all the discarded waste metals, and generates significantly more than 1 megawatt of clean, green energy from a typical tonne of residual household or commercial waste. It uses heavily-patented technologies involving a combination of gasification and pyrolysis. Uniquely, the system is designed to recover valuables in the waste via cleaning, sterilising and decoating the metals embedded in the waste and converting the organic content of the waste into a clean synthetic gas, similar to natural gas, which is used to produce renewable electricity by fuelling high-performance gas engines and steam turbines.
- as part of the region’s drive towards renewable energy, Bee’ah has made major investments in infrastructure to achieve the 100% landfill diversion target set for the Emirate of Sharjah by 2015. The investment programme is now entering a new phase with the construction with Chinook of the world’s largest gasification plant to recover metal and generate renewable energy from waste.
- now in the first phase of its construction, the Sharjah Project is a significant infrastructure investment by Bee’ah to enable the Emirate to recover maximum value from its waste and put resources back into its economy. The first phase of the plant is due to be completed at the end of 2015. When the second phase is completed, the plant will have the capacity to process 480,000 tonnes per annum. The Sharjah plant will process a wide range of wastes and recycling residues from which it will recover metal and generate renewable energy. When complete, the plant will be capable of generating over 80 megawatts per hour of power, enough electricity to power over 150,000 homes.
- the facility will have a negative overall carbon footprint and is set to achieve a total reduction of 400,000 tonnes of CO2 per year, and will be a net producer of potable water, supplying more than 15 tonnes per hour, which will be used for local landscaping and irrigation.
2.UK Trade and Investment: UK Trade and Investment (UKTI) is the government department that helps UK-based companies succeed in the global economy. We also help overseas companies bring their high quality investment to the UK’s economy – acknowledged as Europe’s best place from which to succeed in global business. UKTI offers expertise and contacts through its extensive network of specialists in the UK, and in British embassies and other diplomatic offices around the world. We provide companies with the tools they require to be competitive on the world stage. For more information on UKTI, visit www.gov.uk/ukti.
3.Media enquiries:
Christina Murphy, UKTI Press Office Tel: +44 (0) 20 7215 5245 Email: christina.murphy@ukti.gsi.gov.uk
Martin Nye, Director, Chinook Energy Tel: +44 (0) 115 896 8000 or +44 (0) 7831 343 142 Email: martin.nye@chinookenergy.com
Steve Martin, Business Development Manager, Chinook Sciences Tel: +44 (0) 115 896 8000 or +44 (0) 779 510 2742 Email: steve.martin@chinooksciences.com
Shirlene Campbell Ritchie, Freestyle Marketing Communications Ltd Tel: +44 (0) 115 969 0182 or +44 (0) 780 085 1384 E-mail: shirlene@freestyleuk.com