Letters to the Minister of Environment on 'EFW is Dirty Energy'

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Incineration was banned in the early 90s by the NDP government at the time. It was the right decision then and still is.

Incineration is just a ‘Landfill in the sky’ - 70% of what goes in is emitted through the stack into the atmosphere. Much of that is indeed water vapour but, in addition, the proposed facility will emit 44 tonnes of Sulfur dioxide, 151 tonnes of Nitrogen oxides, 56 tonnes of carbon monoxide, and 61 tonnes of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs).

The incinerator will also be a major producer of greenhouse gases - a tonne of waste produces a tonne of CO2.

Garbage does not burn naturally.  The incinerator will need to be augmented with natural gas to burn the material.  This is hardly energy efficient.  The burnt material is lost to the atmosphere eliminating it's life cycle, whereas it could have been recycled.

The myth that this incinerator is going to create energy for the Region is laughable.  When was the last time that a mega-energy project went well and on budget?  All our power facilities currently have issues and are a source of continual financial problems.  Are we to be poisoned and saddled with a gross debt?

Regarding the issue of getting some good out of garbage that is burned, please consider the resources that will be burned by incinerators. These resources will not be available except as pollutants to the Earth's inhabitants who will be breathing them for ever more.

I support requests that the Minister refer the environmental assessment to the Environmental Review Tribunal on the grounds that the energy produced by this facility will replace clean baseload energy from nuclear and hydro sources with perhaps the dirtiest energy in the province.

Because incinerators have to operate continuously, they must necessarily be part of the baseload energy supply which currently in Ontario is supplied primarily with much cleaner nuclear energy.

As coal plants are phased out as promised, this incinerator can be expected to be producing the dirtiest energy in the province 24 hours per day - and will be doing so for the next 25 years or more.

140,000 tonnes of garbage will produce 140,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide every year vs nuclear which produces none.