There are only about 68 operational anaerobic digesters in the UK that utilize either food or farm derived waste as feedstock, the number of plants grew by over 30% in 2011 and with many other facilities at various stages in the planning process.As a result now is an ideal time to review how these existing plants are currently designed, how they perform in practice on a range of waste types and what we can learn from operating experiences so far. As operational data from these plants is sparse it is difficult to compare performance and assess the effectiveness of our current design philosophies.However what is apparent is that some wastes are proving more challenging to treat than others and that there is evidence emerging of specific operational problems. Solutions to some of these problems will be delivered at the design stage whereas others will require the application of atoolkit of operational fixes. Potential changes in the pipeline to food waste collection systems are likely to have an impact on digester feedstockand this in turn will influence digester operating regimes. Such changes are best understood through a fuller investigation of those factors that influence performance, based on the experiences gathered from full-scale plant operation.This 1-day conference will review the performance of a number of full-scale facilities treating a range of waste types, in an attempt to improve digester design, better understand process economics and identify those factors which might contribute to underperformance or process failure.