HomeMy WebLinkAboutCOM 1062.004 2006-2008
P/M
To: Chairman Pete Hoffman and County Council members
Date: March 10 2008
Re: Testimony-Resolution 551-08
There are better solutions for Big Island solid waste disposal than incineration. There have been 23 public and private,
varied-purpose, incinerator plants built by Wheelabrator since 1975. The most recent is a gas-fired plant purchased
twelve years ago by Simpson Paper Company in Anderson California. There are only 5 full-time employees at this
plant. On a per-ton basis, recycling and sorting alone, provides at least ten times more jobs than incineration. Add
composting and mulch production, and the economic benefits out weigh by far the minimal employment opportunities
provided by an incinerator.
Within the last 12 years many large communities including Seattle, Boulder and Los Angeles have adopted a zero-
waste policy. In May 2008, Boulder City Council voted in favor of a resolution stating the city °hereby encourages the
pursuit of Zero Waste as a long-term goal in order to eliminate waste and pollution in the manufacture, use, storage and
recycling of materials.' Council members also approved a waste reduction plan to achieve 85% recycling and
composting in the City of Boulder by 2017. Recycling has made a dramatic impact on the economy of the City of Los
Angeles, which estimates that the local recycling industry, including collectors, processors, and manufacturers,
generates over $600 million in sales and employment annually.
The use of incinerators has been on the decline in the United States. Of the 186 Municipal Solid Waste incinerators
operational in 1990, only 112 remained by 2003. An incinerator should beat the bottom of the list as a solution to Big
Island solid waste disposal. Here on the Big Island, solid waste should be regarded as a resource for recycling, re-use,
compost and mulch production, and to provide jobs, and encourage entrepreneurship.
The incinerator will contractually require a minimum tonnage per year to generate the electricity to be sold to HELCO.
Our recycling progress could be reversed and much of our green waste which provides tons of mulch, will likely be
incinerated to meet the contractual demands for solid waste tonnage. If the required tonnage is still insufficient, we
could be trucking garbage form Kona or barging it in from Maui or paying fees to make up the difference.
The waste-to-energy electricity generated by an incinerator will do nothing to decrease our already excessively
expensive electrical rates. A substantial reduction in electrical rates would be best implemented by a large scale solar
project which could be built at zero up front costs.
A significantly smaller percentage of the almost $128 million earmarked by Hawaii County for an incinerator would be
best spent on a new state-of-the-art landfill and an education program starting with kindergarten on through high school
promoting the zero-waste culture. Within 15 years this island could be easily diverting 90% of its solid waste from the
new landfill into productive and profitable enterprises through waste reduction, re-use, recycling, requiring recyclable
packaging from manufactures, composting, and mulch production.
Approximately 30% (by weight) of everything incinerated will result in toxic ash which must be carefully disposed of.
Incinerators waste natural resources, transfer liabilities to future generations and are potentially damaging to human
health. Incinerators do not eliminate waste, but change the form of waste into hazardous air emissions and toxic ash.
They are a source of 210 different dioxin compounds, plus mercury, cadmium, nitrous oxide, hydrogen chloride, sulfuric
acid, fluorides, and particulate matter small enough to lodge permanently in the lungs.
In 1991, Ontario Canada became the first provincial-level jurisdiction in North America to ban future municipal solid
waste incinerators. Ontario's Minister of Environment, Ruth Grier, said,'Indneration is inconsistent with reduction,
reuse and recycling because it relies on a steady, large quantity of mixed waste. Incineration gives the illusion of making
waste disappear when, in fact, it reappears in different and often more hazardous fortes. Incineration is a superficial
solution which does not attack the root of the problem." Let's not strap ourselves to huge debt for decades to come with
a solution that is rapidly becoming obsolete.
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Jay Kelley 3
45 Pakalana St.
Hilo, HI 96720 ~n .
808-961-6851 CAOMM, • o
Ref. To, Presexl*
Ref. Data MAR 112008
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