[greenyes] fwd: re - Review of Environmental and Health Effects of Waste Management

["paul illich" <paul_illich@no.address>]

fwded from bluegreenearth/tim barton by paul illich -

UK-ROI_Incinerators@no.address wrote:
Re: Review of Environmental and Health Effects of Waste Management

Liz Crocker of Ban Waste asked on 26 July the position over an
incinerator tax in view of the Minister saying he's consult
'Stakeholders' following the disgraceful Defra report.

Claire Wilton, FOE's Senior Waste Campaigner recently replied to me
essentially that FOE has put the issue on the back burner - including
contesting the Defra report - till after the budget.

Max Wallis
formerly FoE Cymru waste campaigner

Claire wrote on 4 August:

in our advance press release on Defra's report, we based our
"expectations" of what it would say on health (which of course is
just a way of saying what Friends of the Earth thinks it should say)
on the CRN Maximising Recycling report - see:
http://www.crn.org.uk/gifs/tackling%20residuals%20web%20version.pdf.

This report is the best thing we have at the moment which compares
the toxicity impacts of incineration, landfill as well as other forms
of waste management e.g. MBT. We are still using this research as our
benchmark, until and unless other research becomes available which
tells a different story.

You will remember that the CRN report suggested that the waste
management option which fared best in terms of human toxicity was MBT
with the residuals from the process going to a cement kiln.

However, in our briefing on the CRN report we say: "Friends of the
Earth cannot accept that these wastes should go to power stations or
cement kilns. These stations are using dirty fuels with poor
pollution abatement technology. They should be forced to clean-up as
a matter of urgency." If they did clean up, then burning waste in
them would not be so vastly better than burning fossil fuels
currently is, and the advantage they are given in terms of toxicity
by the CRN report would be much less.

The human toxicity analysis in the CRN report is also subject to a
number of uncertainties, as the authors readily admit. All this is in
the FOE briefing:
http://www.foe.co.uk/resource/briefings/maximising_recycling_rates.pdf

We are still arguing that the Government should introduce a tax on
incineration, or else a graduated waste tax applied to all forms of
disposal. From meetings I've had with ministers & officials I think
that Elliot Morley is persuadable on this, but the Treasury is not at
all interested. The campaign is taking a back seat at the moment as
FOE has other priorities for the Treasury for the next 9 months -
mostly climate and transport related. We hope to pick up the campaign
after the next Budget. Whether any disposal tax is applied to burning
waste in cement kilns would probably depend on whether the Government
/ EU views that operation as 'disposal' or 'recovery'.

best wishes, claire.

_________________________________________________________________
It's fast, it's easy and it's free. Get MSN Messenger today! 
http://www.msn.co.uk/messenger