MPs call for stopping plans to expand the incinerators in Britain | air pollution

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MPs called for a halt to expansion of new waste incinerators just days before councils in London voted to award a contract to build a massive new plant in Edmonton.

A report by the all-party parliamentary group on air pollution says expansions must be halted immediately to protect human health and cut carbon emissions.

The report concludes that nanoparticles emitted by large-scale incineration pose a significant health risk. Geirant Davis, the Labor MP and chair of the group, said the expansion of the Edmonton incinerator and others must be stopped.

“Air pollution already kills 64,000 people across the UK every year, so government planning which will double incineration capacity by allowing 50 new waste incinerators to be built by 2030…must be stopped immediately as it will lead to significant growth in nanoparticles, which are most dangerous to human health,” he said.

“Importantly, the number of particles, as opposed to their compound mass, is a major determinant of human ill health. The smallest particles act as a gas and penetrate smoothly into the bloodstream and organs, causing damage to the hearts, brains and lungs of victims.”

There are at least 90 incinerators in the UK and another 50 are proposed or under development, according to government data and data collected by the UK anti-incineration group Without Burn Network (Unwin).

The group of deputies heard evidence from Ruggero Ridolfi, an oncologist with more than 40 years of clinical experience, who found heavy metals in the fingernails of children living near incinerators and shed light on the link to childhood acute leukemia. Research by Kirsten Bowman, of ToxicoWatch, an independent non-profit organization dedicated to raising awareness of toxic risks, found dioxins in chicken eggs 10 kilometers from incinerators that emit them.

The report was published days before seven councils in north London were asked to vote on a contract to award the rebuilding and expansion of the capacity of the Edmonton incinerator, operated by the North London Waste Authority (NLWA), by 200,000 tons.

Protests against the Edmonton incineration include demonstrations by area doctors who have called on council leaders to support cleaner and alternative ways to deal with local waste. Recycling rates in north London are just 30% and more than half of the waste incinerated is easily recyclable, according to Defra.

Dr Ed Trana, medical registrar at North Middlesex Hospital, said: “If this continues, you are looking at 35-50 years of continuous waste incineration, much of which does not need to be incinerated and recycled.

“We burn all kinds of materials and we don’t even have a study on how the fumes affect the people who work and live in the area.”

Haringey Council recently called for the expansion to be halted temporarily due to concerns about air pollution.

A recent report from the National Infrastructure Commission warned that rising greenhouse gas emissions from waste incineration would prevent the UK from achieving its net-zero targets by 2050.

To highlight the carbon impact of waste incineration, the APPG report called for the introduction of tax measures to restrict the expansion of incinerators.

Dr. Dominic Hogg, who founded the environmental consultancy Eunomia, told MPs that a 700,000-ton incinerator pumps out about 700 tons of nitrogen oxides (NOx) annually. He said incineration – like landfill – should be taxed in relation to the carbon content of raw materials and emissions of nitrogen oxides, sulfur oxides (SOx), particulates and other pollutants. You must also be part of an emissions trading scheme.

Already, Davies said, poorer communities have experienced worse health outcomes from disproportionately high levels of air pollution and inequality. Recent research by Greenpeace showed that poorer communities were three times more likely to own a holocaust in their area compared to wealthier ones.

He said: “Schemes to increase incineration in London and elsewhere should be suspended to prevent the excess energy driving the burning of recyclable waste.

Protecting and improving air quality must become a central strategy to combat climate change and improve human health at the national and global levels.

“We must apply the precautionary principle to the new waste incineration in urban sites so that the cumulative health risks of nanoparticles do not materialize in dense population centers.”

Clyde Lukes, President of NLWA, said: “We are absolutely clear that our facility will be the safest and cleanest in the country, using the latest technology to protect the health of residents and effectively eliminate pollution to zero.

“Introducing an incineration tax and including it in an emissions trading scheme, this would hit cash-strapped local councils and not address the root cause of the problem.

“The main objective should be all the garbage that is produced in the first place. That is why we are investing in the latest recycling technology, the largest investment in such infrastructure in London in decades. But what we really need is a systemic change: for companies to stop Production of single-use plastics, and for that [the] The government to stop years of hesitation and move forward with the urgent reforms that we have been calling for for years. This means mandatory recycling now and a deposit return system now.”

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