Go clockwise round the ring
Go widdershins round the ring
Back to view the whole ring
What's wrong with incinerators
In 1999, some bright spark came up with the idea of building an incinerator at the junction of two tidal rivers in the Southeast. The first local people knew about it was when the PR men for the contractors came round to do their presentation. A few bright people got onto it, and within a few weeks the Regional Authority was denying that there was any arrangement reached about an incinerator. In fact, it seemed that the plan hadn't yet been approved. It would have gone through on a nod and a wink, because it turned out that many local councillors hadn't a clue that "thermal waste treatment" meant incinerator.
As it was, Wexford County Council, on whose land the consortium planned to build the incinerator, refused to approve the waste management plan that would have legitimised it. At present, the campaign rolls on, because it's not likely that the businessmen and officials who want the incinerator (it's money for the consortium, and a quick solution to waste for the officials) will give up that easily. The Centre for Research on Environment and Community helped organise the first public meeting against the incinerator, and produced this leaflet as an opening shot in the campaign.
For more information on incinerators, the Kilcock anti-incinerator campaign's links page is a good starting point; see also the interview with Ralph Ryder on these pages .
Incineration and ordinary people
Information sheet
Centre for Research on
Environment and Community
Why does incineration worry people?
- In Clonmel (Co. Tipperary), farmer John Hanrahan lost over 220 cows to birth defects, cancer and other ailments. After a long legal battle it was admitted that the cause was emissions from the Merck, Sharp and Dohme incinerator.
What is dioxin?
- Dioxin is one of the most dangerous chemicals known. The "tolerable daily intake" for the UK is set at 10 picograms per kg body weight per day (a picogram is one million millionth of a gram). Dioxin is known to cause birth defects, cancer, damage to the immune system and nervous system disorders.
- Dioxins are produced when ordinary plastics are burned at particular temperatures. Since what is burned in a municipal incinerator is uncontrolled and is only minimally sorted, temperatures are bound to fluctuate in the chamber. Further unpredictable reactions also take place in the chimney.
Is dioxin the only worry?
- No. Apart from the risks we know about, it has often taken decades for science to discover and politics to recognise the dangers of specific substances: asbestos, DDT, lead, radioactive materials … But by the time we start to notice a new risk much of the damage has already been done.
Back to top
Scattering our mess around
- Waste doesn't disappear when you burn it. Incineration creates two new kinds of waste, both potentially dangerous. One is the hot gases that escape the chimney. Scrubbers are supposed to catch some of the dangerous materials in these gases. In the real world, human error and equipment failure are common.
- When the scrubbers do work, they don't destroy the risks. Instead, they concentrate them and keep them in the incinerator. Both this light (fly) ash and the heavier (grate) ash in the bottom concentrate the toxicity - and are normally landfilled without testing.
Storage and transport
- To keep furnaces going at high temperatures, a regular flow of waste is necessary. This means dumping it when there's too much and taking in waste from outside the region or from abroad when there isn't enough.
- The proposed incinerator is to burn up to 2 tons of waste per minute. This translates into a continuous stream of trains, trucks or ships coming to and from the incinerator.
Back to top
Jobs
- Some jobs stand to be created close to the incinerator - temporary jobs building the plant, and a limited number of manual jobs in the waste and ash handling. (One of the perceived attractions of "greenfield sites" is that rural workforces can be paid less and are seen as less likely to complain about health risks.) There will also presumably be jobs for e.g. PR people and accountants, although these are unlikely to go to locals.
- Jobs are almost certainly at risk in tourism (particularly the cruise ships, but also in areas affected by smells or ash) and potentially in farming and fishing: dioxins accumulate in the food chain, so that there are major risks from eating animals and fish or drinking milk if they are contaminated. Other businesses (especially the food industry) are likely to avoid the area.
The local community and the region
- Local concerns are naturally raised over immediate issues like health, jobs and house prices. What is less obvious is that the health risks are regional, not local: if the incinerator is to burn at very high temperatures, the gases will go up higher and so be spread across a greater area. With prevailing winds from the SW quadrant, the areas to the N (New Ross, Kilkenny etc.) and E (Wexford town etc.) are all at risk.
- Siting the incinerator at Great Island, at the junction of two tidal rivers, also means that any dioxins that escape into the water will be carried up the Suir (tidal as far as Carrick) and the Barrow (tidal beyond New Ross) as well as downriver past the Hook.
Back to top
Incineration and landfill
- Incineration and landfill are not alternatives to each other. Not all waste can be burned, so that only a proportion of the total waste stream can be incinerated. There will still be landfills - and new storage dumps may have to be built if production of waste outstrips capacity.
Recycling
- A high proportion of waste (25% according to the regional authority) can be recycled. This can be as simple as milk bottles - a classic example of recycling. Parts of Dublin and London now have simple schemes where there is a special box for recyclables (paper, glass, cans etc.) which is emptied regularly like an ordinary bin and the contents recycled.
Sustainable development
- Ireland is committed to "sustainable development" - which simply means thinking more than a couple of years ahead. Incineration is a classic short-term solution: it destroys potentially useful (recyclable or compostable) material by turning it into toxic ash. As waste production grows, yet more incinerators and dumps will be needed - concentrating the health risks and removing valuable materials (organics, metals etc.) from circulation.
Back to top
Who decides?
- Under Local Agenda 21, which the Irish government has signed, all local authorities should plan the development of their areas and regions in open decision-making processes together with community groups, business interests and individual citizens.
- In practice, only one county has even set up a Local Agenda 21 forum, and the decisions of local authorities themselves can be overruled by the city or county managers. There is very little scope for democratic decision-making here.
National waste strategies
- All regions have to prepare waste strategies under new legislation. But in Dublin and Leinster new waste facilities have run into massive popular protests (Ringsend incinerator, Kill dump, etc.) In Cork and West Munster there is a long tradition of successful resistance to dangerous chemical plants. In Galway and Clare there are strong and active environmental groups. So the South-East runs the risk of being the only "soft area" where an incinerator proposal is successful - so that Great Island could wind up housing the national municipal incinerator that was proposed for the whole country years ago.
Back to top
The Centre for Research on Environment and Community (CRECHE) was set up to provide an intellectual resource for environmental NGOs, community groups and other grassroots initiatives in the area of the relationship between the natural environment and the human community.
Go clockwise round the ring
Go widdershins round the ring
Back to view the whole ring