The company behind a proposed waste incinerator near Waimate has been making misleading claims to the community. They have been assuring us that they will recover aggregate from the residue ash and recycle it for use as roading and construction material. However, the company’s resource consent application reveals its true plan for the 100,000 tonnes of toxic ash produced yearly—LANDFILL IT!
The company have lodged a resource consent application with Waimate District Council and Environment Canterbury (ECan). The application states that the company intends to landfill 100,000 tonnes of ash annually for 35 years. The company has also said that they plan to recover aggregate from the ash and use it as a roading or construction material in the future; however, current regulations in NZ don’t allow this, so landfilling is the only option available to them.
This significant fact was omitted from the company’s promotional material for 18 months before lodging resource consent.
“New Zealand is in the middle of a landfill waste crisis. Many of the South Island’s landfills are older, overpacked and failing. The breakdown of these landfills is happening now – we cannot leave this problem for the next generation to deal with.”— Paul Taylor, South Island Resource Recovery Limited (SIRRL) Board Director.
The above text was taken from SIRRL’s Project Kea website.
SIRRL don’t seem to have a problem with burying toxic ash and leaving that for the next generation to deal with.