FAQ

Waste-to-energy incineration is an industrial process in which waste is burnt in a furnace to produce heat. The heat is used to produce steam that drives a generator to produce electricity.* While many different types of waste streams could be incinerated in this way, one of the most damaging is incineration of mixed municipal solid waste. While not condoning or endorsing other types of incineration, the Regeneration NOT Incineration campaign is focused on seeking a ban on incineration of mixed municipal solid waste, specifically.

* Perrot, J.F. & Subiantoro, A. (2018). Municipal Waste Management Strategy Review and Waste-to-Energy Potentials in New Zealand. Sustainability. 10. 3114. https://doi.org/10.3390/su10093114 (p.5).

The Nordic approach to waste-to-energy incineration is often touted as an environmental success, but in reality it reduces recycling and disincentivises waste reduction. In 2017, the European Commission stated that waste-to-energy incinerators create “infrastructural barriers” to actions higher up the waste hierarchy and must be carefully assessed in light of the continent’s circular economy vision. The Commission advised EU countries with existing waste-to-energy incineration facilities (such as the Nordic countries) to phase-out their reliance on these, place a moratorium on new facilities, and invest in waste prevention, reduction, reuse and separate collection and recycling instead. The Commission also discouraged countries without waste-to-energy incineration facilities from building new ones.*

Furthermore, a 2019 study commissioned by the Nordic Council of Ministers found that Nordic countries will not achieve key elements of the EU circular economy package unless they reduce their reliance on waste-to-energy incineration. The report recommended a shift away from incineration towards policies shown to reduce waste generation, including a packaging tax, recycling and recovery rate targets, landfill bans on biodegradable waste, deposit return schemes and extended producer responsibility (i.e. product stewardship).**

* European Commission. (2017). The Role of Waste-to-Energy in the Circular Economy (Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions). Retrieved from http://ec.europa.eu/environment/waste/waste-to-energy.pdf
** Papineschi, J. et al. (2019). Analysis of Nordic regulatory framework and its effect on waste prevention and recycling in the region. Copenhagen, Denmark: Nordic Council of Ministers. Retrieved from https://tinyurl.com/yywmlesv

It's not.

We have a common misconception that incinerators eliminate the need for landfills. While incinerators reduce the overall volume of the waste, they don’t magically make waste disappear. All of the mass that goes into an incinerator must come out as waste incineration residues. These either discharge through the chimney as flue gases and dust particles when not captured by the filter; as waste water from wet flue gas filter devices where these are present; as fly ash discharged in the environment; slag; and boiler ash. If an incinerator is equipped with (wet) flue gas filter devices (scrubbers), various (solid) residues are produced, i.e. scrubber salts, filter cake, sludge, and gypsum. The residual product (about 10-15% of the original volume and 20-35% of the original weight) is generally disposed to landfills. Some countries are attempting to reuse the ash (e.g. as cement), but this requires expensive and underdeveloped processes that attempt to render the ash safe, given that it is full of chlorides, heavy metals and other persistent organic pollutants.*

Regardless, the real issue is not whether incinerators are better or worse than landfills. The real issue is our ongoing production of waste that requires disposal in such facilities. Both landfills and incinerators are central components of a ‘take-make-use-dispose’ linear economy. They’re end-of-pipe technologies to ‘get rid of waste’ rather than top-of-the-pipe approaches to reduce waste, conserve resources and lower greenhouse gas emissions. Incinerators and landfills burn and bury valuable resources we could have repurposed, reused, recycled or composted. Neither solves the problem of the linear economy and neither can be classed as zero waste solutions.**

* Joseph, A.M. et al. (2018) “The Use of Municipal Solid Waste Incineration Ash in Various Building Materials: A Belgian Point of View” Materials (Basel) 11(1). https://doi.org/10.3390/ma11010141
** Envision New Zealand. (2003). Getting There! The Road to Zero Waste: Strategies for Sustainable Communities. Auckland: Zero Waste New Zealand Trust. Retrieved from https://tinyurl.com/y5s2g2hf p.6

Today’s incinerators are much cleaner and have better filters than earlier incinerators, but they’re still not perfect. The process of burning waste produces cancer-causing chemicals called furans (a type of dioxin) and releases them, along with toxic elements like cadmium and mercury, into the atmosphere.*

Pollutants that escape smokestack filters settle on surrounding land where they can accumulate over time. Both dioxins** and heavy metals like mercury*** have toxic effects on the human body, and are especially dangerous to unborn children. When they are ingested by animals, they contaminate dairy and meat. They can also wash off the land into our waterways where they pollute the fresh and marine water species. These toxins can then enter our bodies when we eat contaminated kai moana and kai awa. 

Meanwhile, toxins, heavy metals and other persistent organic pollutants (POP) are not destroyed during the incineration process. Those that are not captured in filters, are released to pollute the air. The rest ends up in ash and slag. What does not escape up the chimney is commonly dumped in landfills.**** Over time, these toxins can then leach into the environment (all landfill liners fail eventually).***** Some countries use incinerator ash in roading and construction, requiring multiple treatment of the ash to attempt to remove pollutants. 

* Ibid., p.5.
** World Health Organisation. (2016). Dioxins and their effects on human health. Retrieved from https://tinyurl.com/y654z6y9
*** World Health Organisation. (2017). Mercury and Health. Retrieved from https://tinyurl.com/y9ppgyf6
**** Perrot, J.F. & Subiantoro, A. (2018). Municipal Waste Management Strategy Review and Waste-to-Energy Potentials in New Zealand. Sustainability. 10. 3114. https://doi.org10.3390/su10093114
***** Joseph, A.M. et al (2018) “The Use of Municipal Solid Waste Incineration Ash in Various Building Materials: A Belgian Point of View” Materials (Basel) 11(1). https://doi.org/10.3390/ma11010141

No. Incineration companies happily point out that the waste they burn would otherwise be sent to landfill. However, what they fail to mention is that household waste is an extremely inefficient fuel. 

The World Energy Council found that not only is waste-to-energy incineration an expensive means of generating energy,* but kilogram for kilogram, burning waste can produce as little as ten per cent the energy of coal and seven per cent the energy of natural gas while producing many times the pollution.** 

In Aotearoa, we generate about 85% of our electricity from renewable sources. The Government plans to increase that to 100% by 2035. Waste-to-energy incinerators impede these renewable energy goals and undermine our commitment to a low emissions economy.

* World Energy Council. (2016). World Energy Resources 2016 - Waste to Energy. (p.486). London: World Energy Council. Retrieved from https://tinyurl.com/yyu697q6
** Ibid., p.457.

NO. Large-scale waste-to-energy incinerators for municipal solid waste are expensive to set up and require a return on investment - a long-term proposition. Once built, most large-scale modern incinerators require a consistent inflow of about 100,000 tonnes of municipal solid waste a year. 

Councils sign long-term contracts requiring them to deliver a minimum quantity of waste for 20 to 30 years. If they do not meet the minimum, they must pay fees to compensate the incinerator company for lost profits. Therefore, waste-to-energy incineration locks councils into an outdated way of wasting valuable, non-renewable resources,* and disincentivise strategies to reduce, reuse or recycle waste because this would leave nothing to burn.**

* United Nations Environmental Programme. (2019.) Waste to energy: Considerations for informed decision making Retrieved from https://wedocs.unep.org/handle/20.500.11822/28413?show=full p.9
** Ibid., p.34.