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James Debono
Incineration is one of a number of technological options being considered by the waste-to-energy advisory committee, appointed by the Minister for Rural Affairs and the Environment.
Director of Environment Policy Chris Ciantar, told MaltaToday that waste-to-energy technologies may be a viable source of energy generation but also a way to reduce the country’s current dependence on landfills, which have a limited 20-year lifespan and occupy vast tracts of land.
Ash produced from incineration will still have to be stored in landfills, but the amount of space required would be less than that required by untreated solid waste.
Standards regulating incineration technology have substantially improved during the past years but critics still point out at the unknown potential side effects of dioxins and furans released into the air. They claim that when an incinerator is built, waste is required to run it. This provides a disincentive to reducing waste production and reusing waste products.
Ciantar said a number of options have been identified for the conversion of waste into energy, including digestion, incineration, gasification and or pyrolyis.
The construction of a waste combustion plant, converting waste into energy, is mentioned as one of Malta’s main renewable energy options in a report on Malta’s renewable energy policy sent to Brussels in November. MaltaToday revealed the contents of the secret report last month.
According to one of these scenarios a waste combustion plant would be operational by 2013 as mentioned in the waste management plan of 2001, since it takes between five to eight years to start operating following the decision to construct the plant.
Ciantar however said these indications had been based on the 2001 Waste Management Plan which is now being changed to include various waste-to-energy options apart from incineration. “The report simply shows the potential energy embedded in our waste and how much energy we can produce if all of our waste is combusted, but since we are currently revising our strategy the targets and deadlines mentioned in the report are likely to change,” Ciantar said.
WasteServ is already adopting a different strategy for different types of wastes. In the coming years the controversial Sant Antnin plant will be producing enough energy for 1,500 households from biodegradable waste.
The EU directive on renewable energy states that three per cent of energy should be generated from waste. Malta’s report on renewable energy states this can only be achieved through waste combustion plant, which comes at significant investment costs. In the absence of this facility, the national target for energy from waste in 2010 is set at 0.24 per cent.
Back in 2005, Environment Minister George Pullicino had announced government wanted to advance the date for implementing incineration technologies by a good eight years from the original 2013 target.
Pullicino had also said the waste-to-energy advisory committee would have to deliver its report by the end of March 2005.
Another committee was also entrusted with reviewing the solid waste management strategy that was adopted in 2001.
A year later however, none of the reports have yet have yet seen the light of day. Chris Ciantar said the two committees have completed a draft document for consultation. This document is currently being reviewed internally. A public consultation on these various options proposed by the committees will take place in the near future.
jdebono@mediatoday.com.mt
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