WASTE WORDS
Vision Vancouver, NPA trade barbs over plans for gasification plant.
Vancouver’s Non-Partisan Association waded into the region’s garbage debate Thursday, suggesting the Vision Vancouver council led by Gregor Robertson is trying to slide a new and environmentally unfriendly garbage-handling facility into the city’s southern neighbourhoods.
Despite long-standing assurances by the city that a proposed modern gasification system for south Vancouver will not use incineration technology and would meet high environmental and health standards, NPA leader Kirk LaPointe said the plant is equivalent to an incinerator and would spew fumes and noxious odours over the adjacent neighbourhood.
“What I am here to talk about is Gregor Robertson’s attack on our community, and the fact that as (the head of) an organization that prides itself on having greener initiatives, he’s only going to turn us green in the gills by basically foisting an incinerator on the community,” said LaPointe, who is running for mayor.
LaPointe, whose party is scrabbling to gain ground in the weeks before the Nov. 15 civic election, accused Robertson of supporting Metro Vancouver’s plans for a new municipal solid waste incinerator and ignoring the health of his citizens. He said local residents near the proposed gasification plant at 8601 Main St. have not been consulted.
“The gasification plant requires incineration. It is going to burn and create gas,” he told The Vancouver Sun. “And there is really no proven technology on this. ”
However, gasification is not considered an incinerator technology by the city and is coming into wider use by governments interested in converting municipal solid waste to recoverable energy through thermal conversion. The technology involves the use of high heat to convert waste into a synthetic gas, which is then burned to create energy.
In a report last November to city council, Peter Judd, the city’s general manager of engineering, outlined how the gasification plant, if accepted by Metro Vancouver, could be built near the existing Vancouver South Transfer Station. He said the plant would involve new waste-to-energy gasification technology and first require the maximum diversion of recyclables and organics. He said energy recovered from the plant could be piped to the Cambie neighbourhood energy zone, which is home to 20,000 residential units.
Last year, the city proposed the “zero waste innovation centre” as an alternative to Metro’s desire for a new incinerator somewhere in the region. Metro wants to phase out its old incinerator in Burnaby, and its landfill at Cache Creek is reaching capacity. It is considering as many as six as-yet-unrevealed locations for a mass-burn incinerator.
Judd also told council the gasification plant would have to meet or exceed local and international air quality standards, as well as hit the city’s targets for reduction of greenhouse gases.
But those points were ignored by LaPointe, who told reporters the plant would be bad news for both the city and local residents. Robertson, he said, “would contaminate a neighbourhood with noxious fumes.”
“We believe there are other solutions to our garbage issue. We believe there are landfills and recycling facilities and other ways to sort through it that are going to be far, far less harmful,” he said.
Vision Coun. Raymond Louie scoffed at LaPointe’s allegations, noting the city has for the last three years opposed any proposal by Metro Vancouver to mass-burn its garbage.
“I’d say he is fearmongering, if anything. This is purposeful deception on his part and is unfair to our citizens for the candidate who wants to be mayor, to be putting out misinformation like that,” Louie said.
Belkorp Industries Inc., which comanages the Cache Creek landfill where Metro ships most of the region’s garbage, has proposed a new “mixed waste recovery facility.”