The consortium, which consist of industrial energy specialist Sembcorp Utilities UK and I-Environment, an arm of Japanese investment firm Itochu Corporation, will build a rail loading waste transfer station in Merseyside and energy-from-waste plant in Teesside.

Planning permission for both facilities, expected to cost £250m to build, has already been secured.

The rail loading waste transfer station will be developed at an existing rail-linked warehouse in Knowsley Industrial Estate.

From here, waste will be transported by rail to the new 450,000 tonnes per year energy-from-waste facility, which will be developed on a rail linked site at Wilton International – a 2,000 acre industrial estate managed by Sembcorp Utilities UK near Redcar on Teesside.

The new energy-from-waste facility will generate electricity for the equivalent of 63,000 homes and has the potential to provide steam directly to adjacent business customers, which would further improve its efficiency.

David Palmer-Jones, Chief Executive Office of SITA UK said: “The two new facilities that we will develop will enable all of Merseyside’s household waste to be put to good use.

“We will create over 70 new full time jobs in Merseyside and Teeside and several hundred more during the construction of our new resource recovery facilities.”