A look at the pros and cons of burning Croydon's waste
CONTROVERSIAL plans for a household waste-burning incinerator will save taxpayers millions and significantly reduce the borough's carbon footprint, waste chiefs have claimed.
South London Waste Partnership (SLWP) also revealed public consultations will soon be launched as they unveiled Viridor as their 'preferred bidder' to run the plant.
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Press conference to announce the preferred bidder for the new Croydon incinerator
The incinerator earmarked for the Croydon/Sutton border, in Beddington Lane, is expected to burn up to 275,000 tonnes of waste a year currently dumped in landfill at the site.
Its state-of-the-art combustion system will also generate 26MW of electricity from burning non-recyclable rubbish – enough to supply 30,000 homes with power every year.
And with Croydon, Sutton, Kingston and Merton councils currently spending around £12 million a year on landfill tax alone, chiefs insist an incinerator is the only affordable option in belt-tightening times.
SLWP director Frank Smith said: "Do we either continue to stick it [rubbish] in a big hole in the ground or generate energy from it?
"It is a no-brainer in terms of an environmentally sustainable solution.
"It has not been a political decision. It is a logical one.
"Every pound sent to the treasury for landfill [tax] is a pound not being spent on public services.
"It is money thrown away. We simply cannot afford to continue."
The incinerator, which would be fully operational within three years, will also create 40 permanent jobs as part of a contract keeping it open for 25 years.
Councils will be charged a standard gate fee per tonne to have waste burned at the plant while Viridor will foot the £200 million bill to build the facility.
Addressing concerns that prevailing winds would blow pollution towards Croydon, Mr Smith said: "We are actually taking things that can be quite offensive and containing them.
"People are raising fears and concerns that are unfounded. We want to provide a solution that is safe."
Answering questions on the energy from waste versus waste prevention, reuse and recycling strategy, he added: "Despite the fact we will have the ability for energy recovery from waste we want people to continue to recycle.
"We expect people's recycling habits to improve as we go into the future."
Dan Cooke of Viridor said the incinerator's design would "complement the local landscape".
Around 215,000 tonnes of waste from Croydon, Sutton, Kingston and Merton is dumped in landfill sites underground every year.
Local authorities are forced to pay a £56 per tonne landfill tax on all waste which is set to rise £8 every year for the next three years – a further £5 million annually by 2014 which councils say they cannot afford.
But despite the incinerator's ability to convert 95 per cent of all waste into energy within hours – by burning material at more than 850c – around 50 per cent of its chimney's emissions would be carbon dioxide – raising questions about its green credentials.
The remaining five per cent is a compound called "fly ash" – a hazardous substance which would be buried in landfill.
A planning application is expected to be submitted to Sutton Council in the first half of 2012 at which point the public will have their say.
Chair of SLWP's joint waste committee Phil Thomas said: "I know residents who live in the vicinity of the Beddington Lane site will have lots of questions around issues like traffic and emissions.
"We are committed to systematically working through these and a lot of effort will go into making sure everyone has the chance to have their say."
It was confirmed Croydon residents will have an equal say alongside the three other boroughs being consulted.
3 Comments
by Chris_Wilcox
Sunday, January 01 2012, 10:05PM
“Boris, and his anti-pollution treatments:
http://tinyurl.com/c3calom
According to this it will reduce harmful pollutants by 14%, and work will be done on Beddington Lane. Trouble is the Bottom Ash left over from Incineration ( part of the bit lobbed in Landfill ) will be a lot dustier then that. So expect a net rise in pollutants, even with the Boris-glue. 14% is small-fry.
As for what comes out of that Chimney? Let's just say it is not very nice. Why they insist on building these things in residential areas I never will understand. Why not stick it out of town?”
by HalfaTalkrate
Sunday, January 01 2012, 9:03PM
“According to the Croydon Conservatives' website, the Waddon team promised back in 2010 to "Oppose any incinerator being built in Croydon or on the border of Sutton".
In the run up to the last council election, the Tory website dismissed as "scaremongering" and a "big untruth" warnings from Labour and the Greens that "the Conservatives have a secret plan for an incinerator in or near Croydon". They said "we have made it absolutely clear that Croydon Conservatives do not support incineration at all and will absolutely not have an incinerator in our borough or support one close to our borders."
Now they have just voted in favour of an incinerator.
Their hypocrisy and lies are breathtaking.
Shame on them.”
by SMOGBAD
Sunday, January 01 2012, 8:55AM
“London air is already very dangerous,and faces massive fines from the EU for repeatedly failing WHO pollution levels,which have a high cost in early deaths.The extra road traffic generated by waste-in and ash-out will add to this.Further the extensive chimney plumes will spread dangerous particles, too small to filter.
The radioactive waste stream planned is very worrying.The effects of alpha emitting dusts have been ignored since Hiroshima:
I just want to reiterate why infants and children are so vulnerable to "fallout" of all kinds:
• Their small body weight means they get a much higher dose/kilo (5lbs versus adult 150 lbs) of any contamination
• Their gut absorbs radionucleotides X100 more than an adult:
• they have very many rapidly dividing cells which means they many more at the stage sensitive to irreparable DNA damage (TP just before G2)
• Thyroxine is a vital co-hormone in very many metabolic processes,so its reduction due to I 131 induced thyroid damage is a much more crucial issue for the infant.
• The immunological system is immature and inefficient (vulnerable to infection and poor at repair processes)
• Liver enzyme systems have not developed well enough to cope with any extra detoxification needed
The recent 14,000 extra baby deaths in the NW US,in line with Fukushima fallout, raise issues including the replacement of Caesium 137 ( gamma ray emission from Ba intermediate) for potassium and strontium 90 ( beta decay and from Ytrium[more energetic]) for calcium in heart membrane depolarisation and conductive pathway conduction and muscle contractions respectively.
Radiation safety standards are set based on the assumption that everyone exposed is a healthy man in his 20's, and that radioactive particles ingested into the body cause no more damage than radiation hitting the outside of the body. However in the real world radiation affects small children much more than adults and small particles of radiation called "internal emitters" which get inside the body are much more dangerous than general exposures to radiation. American and Canadian authorities have virtually stopped monitoring airborne radiation, and are not testing fish for radiation. (Indeed, the EPA reacted to Fukushima by raising "acceptable" radiation levels). So , as in Japan , radiation is usually discovered by citizens and the handful of research scientists with funding to check, and not the government. The Japanese government's entire strategy from day one has been to cover up the severity of the Fukushima accident and this has likely led to unnecessary, additional deaths. Indeed, the core problem is that all of the world's nuclear agencies are wholly captured by the nuclear industry … as are virtually all of the supposedly independent health agencies. So the failure of the American, Canadian and other governments to test for and share results is making it difficult to hold an open scientific debate about what is happening."”