The Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development has signed a contract with Armech Africa Limited, a Ghanaian Joint Venture company, for downstream waste management and recycling in Accra.

Armech Africa Limited would lead in the construction of the Accra Integrated Waste Management System to receive all the waste generated daily in Accra and, after extracting valuable recyclable goods, convert the remaining waste to electricity for the national grid.

The contract also mandates Armech Africa to build six modern transfer stations around Accra to receive waste from independent upstream collectors and the main process plant, near Tema. `

The waste would then be transferred to the Tunnel Bio-Reactor using a containerisation transport model based on the logistics designed and built by Armech for Veolia in Sydney, Australia.

The contract was signed by Mr C. K. Bonbieu, the Chief Director Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, on behalf of the sector Minister; Mr Collins Dauda; and Mr Rex Michau, the Chief Executive Officer of Armech Africa, and was witnessed by Mr Andrew Quainoo, the Director, Armech Africa.

The other signatories are: Mr Alfred Okoe Vanderpuije, Accra Metropolitan Assembly; Mr Isaac Ashai Odamtten, Tema Metropolitan Assembly; Mr John Kwao Sackey, Ga East Municipal Assembly; Mr Jerry Akwei Thompson, Ga South Municipal Assembly; Ms Rita Odoley Sowah, La Dade Kotopon Municipal Assembly; and Mr Adams Nuhu, Awutu Senya East Municipal Assembly.

Armech Africa is a Joint Venture between a Ghanaian Company; Doxa Worldwide and the Armech Group from New Zealand, in association with Clarke Energy (GE) from the United Kingdom.

The project would also process up to a massive 3000 MT of Accra’s waste into a credible 57 MW of electricity.

This comprises the handling of four million people’s household waste.

Mr Dauda said the project served as major breakthrough for Accra’s waste management problem, stressing that it would be expanded to other cities to solve much of Ghana’s waste problem that was created by population growth and the lack of downstream waste management.

Speaking to the Ghana News Agency after the ceremony, Mr Quainoo explained that Armech Africa had exclusive rights in Africa to the patented Tunnel Bio-Reactor, an innovative but simple adaption to the existing technology, which converted organic waste into electricity through Anaerobic Digestion.

He said: “The Tunnel Bio-Reactor is a modularised above-ground landfill which transforms outdated waste management by doing away with landfills and creating the cleanest bio-energy from waste.

“The Tunnel Bio-Reactor is classified as ideal for Ghana and Africa; it is rapid-build, mobile, easily-scaled, simple to maintain and operate, and long outlasts landfills”.

He said one recycling plant and tunnel bio-reactor could replace 10 landfills over a 50-year period.

The Tunnel Bio-reactor would be built, shipped and installed by Armech’s long-term business partner, Singamas - the world’s second largest container manufacturer.

He said it comprised rows of ship-container shells joined together and stacked on top of each other. The tunnels have sealable doors on each end and rails on the floors onto which bins are filled with macerated organic waste and then rolled, as rolling-stock, into the tunnels.

The tunnels are then sealed, and 100 per cent of the gas is extracted over a 45-day process through a simple methane gas draw-off pipeline with valves.

Mr Quainoo commended the Chief of Staff, Mr Julius Debrah, and Mr Okoe Vanderpuije, as well as Officials of the Ministry of Local Government for their commitment to the project.