Why waste incinerators are a real disaster

Published: 12 May, 2011

• WHAT happens to our domestic waste? 

This week Camden publishes its plan, “for the next 25 to 35 years” according to the North London Waste Authority (NLWA).

It supports a new incinerator-fuel plant in Muswell Hill. 

But new incinerators, like at Brent Cross, are a complete disaster. They are unnecessary, hazardous, inefficient, and a huge waste of resources. 

We cannot continue to extract material from the ground, use it, but then dispose of it by landfill or incineration. 

Our planet needs “repair-reuse-recycling” and a vast reduction in domestic waste, worldwide – see www.no-burn.org

We need thousands of new jobs in design and recycling, so that products last longer, and can be dismantled at end of use. For this sort of vision, look not far away – to Scotland! North of the border has the only government “zero waste” policy in the world. It is demanding major industrial changes, by force of law, for much lower waste quantities and 70 per cent recycling by 2025.

The chair of the NLWA says how harmless the Pinkham Way depot at Muswell Hill would be. 

He should justify instead why we need to burn London’s waste.

He knows that plastics and paper must be left in incinerator fuel to burn. 

New contracts will be for £4billion, even riskier than the London Underground maintenance disasters!

Who wants this New Journal lead story in the 2020s? 

“Ten years ago, the authority signed a 25-year deal to provide waste to burn. But this cash-saver has quickly turned into a money-pit, as the authority is forced to send increasingly valuable recyclable material to the incinerator in order to meet its quota. The incinerator has been dogged by high levels of flies and foul odours.”

This exact quote applies already to Kent County Council. 

So why are new incinerators – a distortion of the use of landfill tax – the only option? Why not go for “zero waste”, and visit Scotland instead!

JOHN COX
Chelsea Close, NW10

• THE NLWA area (Barnet, Enfield Haringey, Camden, Islington, Waltham Forest) produces about 1,000,000 tonnes of  household waste a year. 

Of this, 28.9 per cent is recycled. Only a third of what could be recycled actually is. The rest is put in black bins and is either incinerated or sent to landfill.

The Edmonton incinerator consumes 500,000 tonnes pa. 

So every year around 300,000 tonnes of waste is burned which could have been recycled.

Last week was a referendum as to whether to choose the AV system or not. Perhaps we should regard our recycling bins and black bins as ballot boxes. We also have an influence every time we throw something away. That object you are about to throw away also represents a tiny amount of power 

Whether to vote for the black bin option – horrendously expensive incinerators – locking society into the same for 25 years as the money for the incinerator has to be clawed back by procuring waste contracts – an Energy from Waste EfW plant at Brent Cross and a Mechanical Biological Treatment MBT plant on the Pinkham Way site, at present a woodland.

Or for zero waste – the green bin/box option – a more flexible, sustainable future, providing more jobs in the long run.

This is not as unrealistic as it sounds. There are many areas in Camden and Islington where there are large numbers of flats. But this is no different from many European countries where most people live in flats. Germany manages to recycle 50 per cent of its waste. Some areas in northern Italy also recycle 80 per cent. Ursubil, near San Sebastian, increased recycling from 28 per cent to 86 per cent when an incinerator was planned. If Ursubil can do it, then why not north London?

The NLWA is conducting a consultation until June 22. Basically, the choice is between mass burn incineration or the zero waste model. Please take part.

PHIL FLETCHER
Co-ordinator of Barnet and Enfield Friends of the Earth, Pinkham Way Alliance