Barry Friesen of the Hamilton Spectator argues that careful consideration should be made before building waste-to-energy plants.
I agree. Incineration is third on the waste management hierarchy, after waste reduction and recycling/composting. WTE should not be installed as a replacement for material recycling; WTE is designed to complement recycling programs because not all waste is feasible to recycle. That is where a fine line forms. What is feasible to recycle differs in many people's minds. Plastic bottles, for some time, were often not considered to be worth recycling because the manufacture of the plastic is quite energy-efficient and the petroleum feedstocks that make up the plastic itself were quite cheap. Transporting and collecting airy, light plastic bottles was not considered to be worth the cost. Incineration of these bottles yields a great deal of energy. Nowadays, bottle recycling is much more cost-effective and the highly-refined plastic is more valuable for its material content than its energy content.
Incineration of other plastic items, such as wrappers, bags, and miscellaneous containers, probably is more energy-efficient than recycling if the plastic is burned at a combined heat and power facility.
Metal and glass obviously are better off in the recycling stream. They don't burn! Incineration can, however, aid in the recovery of metals. Some waste (such as the Asian food takeout containers) has small metal handles and parts. In the WTE plant, the paper would burn up and the steel would be left for later collection.
It is more difficult to justify the combustion of waste in North American incinerators than in European ones because NA units tend to be electricity-only, and they are only about 20% efficient at converting the heat into electricity due to restrictions on the steam temperature that can be made in incinerators. Temps higher than about 800F in the boiler will lead to corrosion on the furnace-side walls of the boiler tubes. This corrosion is due to the high chlorine content (bleached paper, PVC, salt) of waste compared to fossil fuels. Adding heat recovery to the plant can boost efficiency to well over 85%, but to recover heat the plant needs to be located in the city.
As for the question of putting Waste-to-energy plants in our cities, I would have no problem living next to one. Other people may be more resistant.
When new facilities are proposed, there is always concern that the high capital costs of the plant that need to be paid off will encourage the production of waste to keep the ovens fired up and the electricity flowing. Building a plant with several smaller burners instead of one large one would allow it to run at reduced capacity if for some reason waste production fell off or recycling rates went up. The waste could also be co-fired with biomass fuel.
Ideally, Waste-to-Energy should come after source reduction, reuse, and sensible recycling (meaning don't try recycling every last cigarette butt, gum wrapper, and bottle cap because it takes more resources that it is worth).
