AGL Energy has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with waste site remediation company, Nu-Rock Building Products to investigate the feasibility of utilising their waste recycling technology to convert coal ash into construction bricks at Bayswater power station.

The unique process undertaken by Nu-Rock permanently converts large volumes of solid and liquid industrial waste materials into a range of environmentally sustainable building products.

AGL Chief Operating Officer, Markus Brokhof said the MOU with Nu-Rock would explore recycling waste in an innovative way for AGL, along with our strategy to convert our thermal power station sites into an ecosystem within a circular economy.  

“This technology is a great example of using various value streams, as we produce energy at Bayswater to power the state, our coal ash waste can be recycled for the better by Nu-Rock into bricks that can be used in local construction projects,” Mr Brokhof said.

“Our feasibility study with Nu-Rock will determine whether we can implement this technology at Bayswater, which if approved would provide up to 30 full time local jobs for the first facility which will be the nucleus of our industrial waste cluster.

“We are proud to be an integral part of the Hunter region and contributing to the transition of the community by recycling our waste in a way that is beneficial, providing building supplies for local construction projects.

“We have a very clear plan to rejuvenate our thermal sites into low carbon industrial energy hubs, and this technology would complement those plans, as an operations-led facility at the Bayswater site reducing the volume of coal ash going to landfill.

“As we continue our energy transition, we are exploring more ways to introduce sustainable and renewable facilities and technology at our sites, focusing on how we can generate clean power, lower our emissions and recycle our energy waste for our communities and employees.”

Nu-Rock Founder and Managing Director, Maroun George Rahme said “We are working closely with AGL to develop a process to turn by-product they generate by manufacturing products that using less than 3% of the Embodied Energy  to manufacture,  are carbon negative,  up to 4 hours fire rated, up to 50% lighter and less expensive than conventional materials that cannot meet our standards, to be able to build a better future leaving no legacy by-product behind and stopping the need to quarry virgin materials to make conventional products that cannot be recycled completely at the end of their life”.

Earlier this year, AGL brought forward the closure windows of its coal-fired power stations, with Bayswater set to close no later than 2033.

Following the proposed demerger, AGL’s large baseload power generation assets including Bayswater, will be assets of Accel Energy and will be rejuvenated into low carbon industrial energy hubs.