INCINERATION - THE ARGUMENTS

Why not incineration?

Burning waste, even in modern incinerators, produces pollutants that are known to be highly toxic and could cause cancers. All these chemicals may contaminate the air, water (Darwell, Powdermill and Bewl reservoirs) and nearby farmland. This could be a major threat to babies, children and animals.

Incinerators need to be fed 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. This could mean waste being imported from other counties and even from abroad.

Incineration discourages recycling. The key to resolving the waste crisis is to separate waste at source. Once organic waste, paper, metals etc are separated, they can easily be recycled and composted. East Sussex County Council has a very poor record for recycling.

What should we be doing with our waste if we don't incinerate it?

A lot of people say: we've got all this waste, what should we be doing with it?  Everyone really knows the answer: produce much less waste in the first place, and bring in real recycling (not burning) including doorstep collection systems.  Then bring the problem home by ensuring that each community really takes responsibility for dealing with its own waste, rather than bussing it out to the middle of the countryside.  Introduce alternative methods such as composting which can utilize much smaller-scale plants so that we don't need to use up energy transporting the waste to a small number of enormous waste plants.  The fact is that there are better ways of dealing with waste: building incinerators is the easy way out. 

For more information on alternatives to incineration see the excellent book Creating Wealth from Waste by Robin Murray (published by Demos, it can be ordered from any bookshop).