Leeds, United Kingdom
City population: 746855
Duration: 2013 – 2016
Implementation status: Completed
Scale: Sub-microscale: Street scale (including buildings)
Project area: 1800 m2
Type of area: Building
Last updated: October 2021

The Leeds RERF (Recycling and Energy Recovery facility) is the flagship development at the heart of Leeds Integrated Waste Strategy over the next 25 years. Amidst the timber frame on the buildings southern face there's a green ‘living’ wall creating a visually stunning feature in stark contrast to the building’s industrial use. The feature connects to a green roof and softens the building’s visual impact and provide vital bio-diversity to the site and surrounding industrial area. (1, 6)

Veolia Green Wall and Roof
https://twitter.com/biotecture_/status/777837126079643648

Overview

Nature-based solution

  • Nature on buildings (external)
  • Green roofs
  • Green walls or facades
  • Grey infrastructure featuring greens
  • Institutional green space
  • Green areas for water management
  • Swales and filter strips
  • Sustainable urban drainage systems

Key challenges

  • Water management (SDG 6)
  • Stormwater and rainfall management and storage
  • Green space, habitats and biodiversity (SDG 15)
  • Green space creation and/or management
  • Regeneration, land-use and urban development
  • Promote natural styles of landscape design for urban development

Focus

Creation of new green areas

Project objectives

The design of the green wall intended to provide a significant contribution to local urban biodiversity by focusing on the surrounding landscape character. (3) The associated domed timber roofed structure to (connected to the living wall) is also used to store the incinerator bottom ash as a green roof finish. The roof is also intended to provide water managing benefits, by using Erosaweb geocells to retain pockets of the growing media over the whole surface preventing soil movement and a Roofdrain under the soil retention system to drain excess rainwater away whilst acting as a reservoir board to retain irrigation water. (12) The vertical wall is meant to contribute to the local biodiversity with a field meadow, a shrub mosaic, and a woodland edge, which are maintained by the facility's harvested rainwater. (24)

Implementation activities

Construction work began in October 2013 after Veolia and its plans were selected against the competition by Leeds City Council in 2012. (9, 13, 15) The incinerator opened in November 2016 (4, 14) after a successful testing phase 3 months ahead of schedule. (10) The following was implemented: a 42metre high, 1,800m2 living green wall, approximately 12,000m3 of reinforced concrete, a 4-metre deep bunker with 26 metre high walls, turbine hall, tipping hall, technical rooms, bottom ash building incorporating a green living roof, seven-storey administration block to house both Veolia and Leeds City Council employees, design, visitors’ viewing walkway cantilevering over the living wall at a height of some 23 metres, (6) and a rainwater harvesting and sustainable drainage system (swales and reed beds) to allow wastewater and rain run-off to be absorbed and evaporated, while capturing any impurities. (2)

Main beneficiaries

  • Citizens or community groups

Governance

Management set-up

  • Co-governance with government and non-government actors

Type of initiating organisation

  • Local government/municipality
  • Private sector/corporate actor/company

Participatory approaches/ community involvement

  • Unknown

Details on the roles of the organisations involved in the project

The facility is part of a 25-year PFI contract between Leeds City Council and environmental solutions company Veolia. (4) The facility was designed by the French architect Jean-Robert Mazaud of S’pace Architects. It was built by the French plant engineering and construction company CNIM and English construction company Clugston Construction. (6, 14) ABG were meanwhile asked by the Council for a solution to cover the domed facility with a green roof as a consultant during construction. (12) The plant was supplied by Waste Treatment Technologies (WTT) which has offices in the Netherlands, Germany and Spain. (16) Veolia won the contract obtained from Leeds City Council ahead of competition from a consortium led by Covanta. (9)

Project implemented in response to ...

... an EU policy or strategy? Yes (Stricter EU legislation governing the amount of landfills in each member state has been introduced since 1999 (such as Directive 1999/31/EC on the landfill of waste) as many sites were nearing full capacity. As a result, most countries have been forced to come up with better solutions for dealing with their growing waste streams. Going by the new plant in Leeds, the European Commission noted this is a positive development for both the environment and local communities. (2))
... a national policy or strategy? Yes (Veolia’s chief executive Estelle Brachlianoff said developments in the circular economy provided by the plant “should go hand-in-hand with the Northern Powerhouse”. (11) The Northern Powerhouse is a national agenda proposed by the government - passed on from the 2010-2015 coalition government - to rebalance the United Kingdom's economy by enhancing responsible growth, innovation and productivity in the region. (17))
... a local policy or strategy? Unknown

Financing

Total cost

More than €4,000,000

Source(s) of funding

  • Corporate investment

Type of funding

  • Direct funding (grants, subsidies, or self-financed projects by private entities)

Non-financial contribution

Unknown

Impacts and Monitoring

Environmental impacts

  • Environmental quality
  • Improved air quality
  • Water management and blue areas
  • Improved stormwater management
  • Green space and habitat
  • Promotion of naturalistic styles of landscape design for urban development
  • Increased green space area
  • Increased number of species present
  • Enhanced support of pollination
  • Increased ecological connectivity across regeneration sites and scales

Economic impacts

  • Unknown

Socio-cultural impacts

  • Education
  • Increased knowledge of locals about local nature
  • Increased awareness of NBS and their benefits

Type of reported impacts

Achieved impacts

Presence of formal monitoring system

Unknown

Presence of indicators used in reporting

No evidence in public records

Presence of monitoring/ evaluation reports

No evidence in public records

Availability of a web-based monitoring tool

No evidence in public records

References

(1) Biotecture. (2017). Recycling and Energy Recovery Facility. [Website Unavailable in 2020]
(2) European Commission. [no date]. Impressive Waste-to-Energy Plant to open in Leeds, England. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(3) LivingGreenCity. [no date]. Veolia, Leeds - Living Wall. [Website Unavailable in 2020]
(4) BBC. (2016). Leeds Energy Recovery Plant incinerator officially opens. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(5) Yorkshire Evening Post. (2014). Is the Cross Green incinerator the final piece in Leeds’s recycling jigsaw? Source link [Website Unavailable in 2020]
(6) Clugston. [no date]. Recycling & Energy Recovery Facility: Leeds. Source link [Website Unavailable in 2020]
(7) Lawrence, Nick. (2015). Cleaning up Energy in Cross Green. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(8) Galfré, Stéphane and Camus, Marie-Claire. (2012). Veolia Environmental Services selected by Leeds for a waste management contract. [Website Unavailable in 2020]
(9) Morby, Anna. (2011). Veolia wins race for £550m Leeds waste greenhouse. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(10) Goulding, Tom. (2016). Leeds EfW plant completed ahead of schedule. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(11) Nicholls, Luke. (2015). Veolia puts Leeds at heart of circular economy ambition. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(12) ABG. [no date]. Green Roof Case Study. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(13) Moore, Darrel. (2013). Construction To Begin On Leeds Combined Recycling And Energy Recovery Site. Source link [Website unavailable in 2020]
(14) EUWID. (2016). Veolia officially opens waste to energy plant in Leeds. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(15) Leeds PSC. (2011). Leeds: £550m city incinerator plan a step closer UPDATED. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(16) Eminton, Steve. (2017). Veolia looks to improve recycling side of Leeds RERF. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(17) HM Government. (2015). The Northern Powerhouse: One Agenda, One Economy, One North. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020, Document attached]
(18) Veolia. [no date]. Veolia and Leeds City Council increasing recycling and generating energy from the City’s waste.
Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020, Document attached]
(19) Veolia. [no date]. Corporate Social Responsibility. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(20) Dell'Amore, Christine. (2013). Pictures: Green Walls May Cut Pollution in Cities. Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
(21) Good Goal. (2017). Impressive green roofs and green walls in Europe. [Website not available in 2020]
(22) Everlite Concept. [no date]. Case Study: The beauty in creating energy from waste. [Document attached]
(23) Clugston. [no date]. Energy Recovery Facility, Leeds. [Website not available in 2020]
(24) Mosco, Shelley. (2016). Plant Selection for Living Walls [Document attached]
(25) Baron, John. [no date]. Two waste incinerators approved for Leeds. [Website Unavailable in 2020]
(26) Leeds City Council and Veolia (2018) The Leeds Recycling and Energy Recovery Facility. Source: Source link [Accessed 1 October 2020]
The Green Wall and Roof of the Veolia Recycling Plant (1)
The Green Wall and Roof of the Veolia Recycling Plant
Source: Ref. 1