Dive Brief:

• French company Veolia has won a $1.3 billion contract to process waste from the English county of Hertfordshire at a proposed waste-to-energy (WTE) site, as reported by Bloomberg.
• The company will handle approximately 389,000 tons of waste that can't be reused, recycled or composted over a 30-year period. The facility will generate up to 33.5 megawatts of electricity.
• Construction is scheduled to start next year with plans for the facility to be operational and employ 40 people in 2020. 

Dive Insight:

Bloomberg suggests that this deal is as a sign that Veolia isn't concerned about the U.K.'s plan to leave the European Union. Veolia recently signed a new contract with the borough of Camden in London and three agreements with the Westminster City Council, and the company also purchased plastic-bottle recycling facilities in East London.

Veolia says it converted nearly 47.3 million tons of waste into new material and energy last year and has continued to stay active this year. Since the spring, the company has announced it was teaming up with Covanta for a new WTE facility in the U.K., signed a five-year contract to boost performance at an anaerobic digester in Michigan and made headlines for turning ice cream into energy, among many other announcements.

While companies such as Veolia have continued to roll out new projects, recent analysis from the firm Lux Research found that investments in the U.S. and European WTE market have dropped by 50% since 2014. Material recycling technologies have become the new focus for investors, with a 186% increase in venture capital funding between 2011 and 2016.