Car-crushing giant starts up

Cars are fed into the crusher at one end...

A machine capable of crushing 450 cars an hour is at the centre of one of Europe's largest metal-recycling sites, which officially opened on Wednesday.

The powerful machine is thought to be the world's largest industrial shredder.

It is part of a multimillion pound investment to make Newport one of Europe's leading recycling centres.

The site was officially opened by Economic Development Minister Andrew Davies on Wednesday.

More than £15m has been spent on the terminal, which aims to remove nearly 53,000 lorry trips from the roads.

...and emerge as pellets at the other

Based at Associated British Ports (ABPs) in Newport, it aims to cash in on a booming market - prices for scrap metal have tripled in the last two years, boosted by demand from China.

Sims Group UK, which will operate the site, has invested more than £10m in new equipment, while ABP spent £3.5m preparing the port's infrastructure.

A new rail facility was partly funded by at £1.72m grant from the Welsh assembly government in June 2003, while a gantry crane will also allow ships to be loaded more quickly at the terminal.

Tom Bird, from Sims Group UK, said the car crusher had "the largest shredding box in the world".

"That is the actual physical box where the material is shredded - it is powered by a 9,200 horsepower electric motor," he said.

Scrap metal from old cars is highly sought after

"Inside that box is a big rotor weighting 95 tonnes which spins at 400rpm, crushing the scrap, pushing it through the grids,

"We are able to do 450 cars per hour."

Andrew Davies said it was good news for Newport and south Wales.

"It is one of the biggest operations of its kind in the world," he said.

"It shows public and private sector working together, recycling waste, fulfilling our environmental commitment but creating wealth and creating jobs.