Florida county begins negotiations on expansion of waste-to-energy incinerator

Pasco County, Florida, has taken the first steps to pursue its goal of converting the area’s waste into renewable energy in the coming years.

The Tampa Bay Times reports Pasco County commissioners unanimously agreed on April 28 to begin negotiating with their current resource recovery facility operator Covanta Pasco Inc., Spring Hill, Florida, to design, build and operate an expanded waste-to-energy incinerator. The county’s maximum price tag for those services is $525 million.

Currently the county’s Shady Hills resource recovery facility can handle 950 tons of garbage per day, but 1,100 tons of waste is produced daily. The new incinerator will add another 550 tons per day of capacity to the operation reducing the county’s need to put garbage in an out-of-county landfill.

The county hired Covanta to design, build and operate the facility in 1989 and it began operations in 1991. The current agreement with Covanta ends at the end of 2024.

In October, Pasco solid waste officials advertised to find a company to design and build the new incinerator unit and operate it from 2025 through 2034. Thirty-four companies downloaded the bid package on the job but only Covanta responded.

That prompted county staff to do some industry research to determine whether another bidding process should be opened, according to a memo to the commission from County Solid Waste Director John Power.

That research indicated that the availability of other waste-to-energy operators in the marketplace "was very limited.'' Other major providers in the market have consolidated in the years since the Pasco operation was built and opened and some have left the market in North America all together, the examination concluded.

The county’s purchasing ordinance allows negotiation with a single source in such cases. The total to design, build and operate the expansion would potentially allow expenses of up to $200 million for design and construction of the new incinerator unit and up to $325 million to operate the existing plant and the expansion for the 10 years.

After negotiating the details of a contract, county staff will bring it back to county commissioners for a final vote. County officials anticipate construction of the fourth unit in 2022 and for operation to begin in 2025.