Incinerator will cost public ‘up to €33m a year’

CARBON dioxide emissions from a planned incinerator on Dublin Bay will cost the taxpayer up to €33 million annually, it was claimed yesterday.

At the final day of oral hearings at An Bord Pleanála’s headquarters on the planned incinerator at Poolbeg, an expert warned of potential financial, environmental and health costs.

Local resident and scientist Joe McCarthy objected to the 15-acre incinerator site, criticising submissions by its planned operators, Dublin City Council.

He said the projected output of three quarters of a million tonnes of CO2 annually would leave a bill of between €13.3m and €33.35m to foot the planned carbon credits under the environmental Kyoto Pact.

In addition, Mr McCarthy told inspector Padraic Thornton hearing the case that landfill was a better option to dispose of Dublin’s waste.

Using incineration would be six times worse for carbon emissions than landfill, the hearing heard. Over 25 years, the incinerator would produce 17.3 million tonnes of CO2, while landfill would only result in 3 million, said Mr McCarthy.

Submissions by DCC’s own expert witness Dr Edward Porter were “confusing” and his theories on the Poolbeg site were also inconsistent with international research, claimed Mr McCarthy.

But DCC disagreed and stood over its claim the planned waste disposal facility is better from a climate perspective than landfilling alone or landfilling combined with anaerobic digestion.

Both Dr Porter and Mr McCarthy disagreed fundamentally on the make-up of the carbon emissions and the electricity credit or production from the incinerator.

The planned opening of the incinerator is 2012. It could handle up to 600,000 tonnes of household and non-hazardous waste, taking in 25% of the city’s refuse.

Speaking after the hearing, the objecting scientist added: “Two thirds of a million tonnes of carbon dioxide every year, that’s a huge impact on the current climate problem. But also the issue of health. It will spew out 1,000 different compounds but we won’t know what they are because it’s whatever you put in your bin.”

On top of the carbon credit emission costs, the transport of rubbish to the incinerator is expected to cost €88 a tonne, say objecting residents in Ringsend and Irishtown, who have warned of inevitable traffic chaos.

“Incineration costs more than landfill and it’s worse for the environment, and it has a terrible effect on your health,” claimed the expert.

Officials with An Bord Pleanála say it will take some time to consider the nearly 3,000 objections made about the incinerator and expect a decision to be announced in the autumn.

Irish Examiner