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Veteran
Posts: 275
 
| Here's a controversial topic!
There are a few things that have passed by me recently, that have got me wondering a bit. First, there's the controversy about a possible incinerator at Invergordon, which I gather has now been approved. Then, I was looking at a report last year by the Sustainable Development Commission, which was used to develop the Scottish Renewable Heat Action Plan. This is quite interesting - the Scottish Government has a target that 11% of heat should be produced from renewables by 2020, and the Sustainable Development Commission were asked to comment on how achievable this target is. Their conclusion was essentially that in order to comply with landfill restrictions, it is inevitable that 25% of waste will be burnt for energy by 2020, and in addition we'll get a fair bit of heat from anaerobic digestion of food waste and sewage. On that basis, the SDC view is that it will be easy to achieve the target - so it seems as if we're going to get a whole load of incinerators, like it or not.
The other thing I spotted yesterday was an article about waste-to-energy in Austria - where, since the start of last year, it has been illegal to put anything with more than 5% organic carbon into landfill - which in practice means no household refuse, sewage sludge, paper or plastic go into landfill - which seems a very desirable outcome! this has been achieved by a combination of waste prevention, recycling, and incineration. The incineration often happens in urban surroundings, close to where the waste is generated. Early developments were bitterly opposed by local residents, but the article quotes a more recent example of an incinerator in Linz, planned for next year, where there was not a single public objection. A recent poll in Vienna showed that two thirds of the public saw the waste-to-energy strategy as positive, almsot a third were indifferent, and just 3% opposed it.
So, where does that leave us? As far as I can work out, the technology is available to produce energy from waste in a safe way, although I can't comment on whether or not this will be the case in Invergordon. So, should we hold out for reduction, re-use and recycling? Or should we accept that the only way to make a big dent in landfill is to burn the waste?
My view, to kick things off, is that we should use the R's to reduce waste, but that approach alone isn't going to be enough in the current paradigm - so we need incinerators too. | |
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Regular
Posts: 80
| It's just another example of how crazy the world is. On side of the planet you have the poorest of people using the waste their community produces to create land on which to live. On the other you have Earthships, building sustainable homes from waste. And in the middle you have governments setting fire to waste in some kind of "Green" evironmental gesture, while all the while encouraging their citizen to buy more and waste more to support our economy and the economies of nations we rely on.
Setting fire is the ultimate conclusion to the Capitalist dream. Once an item is "used" (or wasted) it can never be used again by this or any other generation EVER.
Anaerobic digestion makes a little more sense, after all every big garden need a compost heap. Use the heat for the house or greenhouse, and use the methane for cooking.
From a transition point of view for either of these ideas to be useful they need to be small scale, or as you point out "Urban". The waste can't be made to travel far. It's no good building one of these in Invergordon and then shipping all the waste in the Highland region to it via road, by boat has more potential in a post carbon world.
Then you're simply back to feeding the monster. If we start to reduce our waste then more has to travel further, or more people have to live closer to it.
If you want my vision of the future of waste management, then i would say we need community Wombles. Recycling points on every street corner. More signs saying "free to a good home". Warehouses the size of B&Q with reclaimed materials. Nothing is incinerated, nothing thrown away. Community composting for those that don't have the space to deal with their own.
Anyone else for or against incinerators? | |
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Waste to Heat