OREANDA-NEWS. July 16, 2012. With around 200 regional businesses and service providers queuing up to meet the team behind Multifuel Energy’s 300m new plant at Ferrybridge Power Station, yesterday’s event has been hailed as a great success by the organisers.

Multifuel Energy Ltd (MEL) is a joint venture between SSE and Wheelabrator Technologies, and the three-year construction programme for their new plant at Ferrybridge will see hundreds of jobs created. MEL is keen to use local businesses as much as possible, and is encouraged that such a wide range of companies from all over Yorkshire came to meet the project’s main contractor, Hitachi Zosen Inova (HZI) together with its civil engineering supplier Sisk.

Mark McCarthy, MEL Managing Director, is pleased with the turnout to yesterday’s event: “We’ve always said that we want to use as many local businesses and services as possible during the construction and long-term operation of our plant at Ferrybridge, and I was delighted to see so many local companies take an interest in our plans yesterday.

“Over the course of the day we spoke to around 250 guests, and I think this is great news not only for our project but for the Yorkshire economy as a whole”

Head of Supply Management at HZI, Douglas Else-Jack, adds: “The turnout today has been fantastic. I’ve been speaking with a really broad range of different local businesses, some from just down the road and others from different parts of Yorkshire.

“HZI has been involved in nearly 500 multifuel plants around the world, and on a plant of this size, it’s fair to say that around ?10m will be spent in the local economy during construction on staff accommodation and suchlike, so it’s been good to speak to local hoteliers and catering teams as well as engineering, construction and landscaping businesses.”