From Trash to Cash!

[Max]

Cutting jobs is hard work. Creating jobs is genius!

Today we are limited only by our imagination yet those who can imagine a new reality have always been outnumbered by those who cannot. In the beginning, a new idea always has only one believer, and I believe it’s time to reinvent our energy and waste disposal policies. Sudbury could be, should be, and would be a solution to these problems but sadly we lack the vision and leadership in this city, province and country to get it done.

A leader does not solely rely on hand-me-down economies and yesterday's wisdom, but quickly attains a deep understanding of capacity building techniques and key drivers in economic development, and builds on this understanding. A leaders job is to raise the city, province or country's IQ, to be alert to future trends, be able to interpret what they see, and provide future-based answers. This is the hallmark raw ingredient in the makeup of leadership, for in the age of revolution, the future is not more of the past; it's profoundly different than the past.

Though you cannot touch it, smell it, hear it, see it, or taste it, you can sense, think and feel innovation. Innovation is not a dirty word and preserving the status quo is not a quality trait of leaders. Innovation is best described as a pervasive attitude that allows you to see beyond the present and into the future. The search for "Green Technologies" and products is thus presented as a key motor of future economic engines, and global markets for such technology is forecasted to reach 640 billion $ U.S. by 2010.

So much of what we hear about the state of the environment is doom and gloom, with predictions of global catastrophe and visions of a dark, overpopulated and hot future. It’s definitely important to heed the warnings about what’s happening to the planet, however focusing only on the negative will result in us feeling as though the situation is hopeless; it’s not. There is no need to start stashing survival manuals and Just in Time learning is still better than Just in Case learning. Logical thinking is now the most appropriate method for accommodating a state-of-the-art economy and quality of life. This portal file is a good primer for those just learning about the industry.

While most of us think of waste disposal as an earthbound problem, the most common ways we get rid of garbage indirectly send tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Although recycling and composting in Canada currently divert about 40% of solid waste from disposal, the other 60% is disposed in landfill sites or in a few cities burned in incinerators. Both of these latter options result in the release of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere that trap and retain heat from the sun, creating a warming effect on Earth; but incineration produces less greenhouse gas (GHG) than landfilling.

Overall, waste management in Canada directly produces about 3.5 per cent of the nation's total greenhouse-gas emissions. The lion's share of this percentage comes from landfill sites, where organic material buried deep under layers of waste and earth decomposes without oxygen, creating methane. Methane, which comprises about 50-60% of landfill gas volume, is about 24.5 times more potent--mass per mass--as a Greenhouse Gas than carbon dioxide!

Although 41 landfills in Canada recover methane and flare it or use it to generate electricity, "most" of it is released into the atmosphere.

Burning waste, on the other hand, pumps out only one per cent of the nation's total carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide emissions. Although carbon dioxide is the most prevalent greenhouse gas, methane and nitrous oxide are much more potent—with 24.5 and 310 times as much global-warming potential, respectively. All three gases are targeted in the Kyoto Protocol, which aims to reduce greenhouse-gas emission from the most industrialized nations by 2010.

Sudbury owns Greater Sudbury Utility (GSU), which includes Greater Sudbury Hydro Inc (GSHi), but they do not produce one watt of electricity. They simply buy electricity from the province and resell it to local customers. The new landfill gas collection system at the Kingsway dump will soon produce some electricity; but the terms of the 20 year "Landfill Gas to Energy" contract is an extremely bad deal for the city.

Sudbury ratepayers spent over 10 million $ developing the waste utilization plant. The Ministry of Energy agreed to purchase electricity at 11 cents per kilowatt for 20 years, 3 cents above the assumed market price of 8 cents. However, this poorly negotiated power proposal stinks, as electricity rates will not remain at 8 cents over the next 20 years and when it reaches 12 cents we’re losing money.

Based on the reported average 500,000 $ a year rate of return, this project will not turn a profit for more than 25+ years, given the 10 million+ $ investment. Annual operating costs must be deducted from the 500,000 $ revenue source, which extends the payback period. This "methane to market" program is also a partnership with Genco, a subsidiary of GSU, who profits off this venture, which delays the payback period even more.

This project was just a money grab by the Liberal controlled Ministry of Energy who took full advance of the incompetence of Doug Craig and GSHi. This project provides no quick fix to the Greenhouse Gas being emitted into the air; and by their own admission, gases will continue to spew for 25+ years; and we’re now stuck in this deal no matter how lopsided the terms.

A bioreactor landfill is an innovative landfill management strategy called "enhanced or controlled" landfilling to manage solid waste. A bioreactor landfill operates to rapidly transform and degrade organic waste. This bioreactor concept differs from the traditional “dry tomb” municipal landfill approach.

Simply put, bioreactor landfill technology accelerates the biological decomposition of organic wastes in a landfill by promoting conditions necessary for the microorganisms that degrade the waste. The increase in waste degradation and stabilization is accomplished through the addition of liquid and air to enhance microbial processes. By efficiently designing and operating a landfill, the life of a landfill can be extended by as much as 20 years.

A bioreactor landfill is not just a single design and will correspond to the operational process invoked. There are three different general types of bioreactor landfill configurations:

Aerobic - In an aerobic bioreactor landfill, leachate is removed from the bottom layer, piped to liquids storage tanks, and re-circulated into the landfill in a controlled manner. Air is injected into the waste mass, using vertical or horizontal wells, to promote aerobic activity and accelerate waste stabilization.

Anaerobic - In an anaerobic bioreactor landfill, moisture is added to the waste mass in the form of re-circulated leachate and other sources to obtain optimal moisture levels. Biodegradation occurs in the absence of oxygen (anaerobically) and produces landfill gas. Landfill gas, primarily methane, can be captured to minimize greenhouse gas emissions and for energy projects.

Hybrid (Aerobic-Anaerobic) - The hybrid bioreactor landfill accelerates waste degradation by employing a sequential aerobic-anaerobic treatment to rapidly degrade organics in the upper sections of the landfill and collect gas from lower sections. Operation as a hybrid results in the earlier onset of methanogenesis compared to aerobic landfills.

In the bioreactor process the release of Greenhouse Gas emissions is reduced both by higher and quicker recovery rates of landfill gas and from offsetting fossil fuel use with landfill gas energy.

Waste decomposition results in the conversion of biodegradable solid waste into gas, thereby creating additional landfill space. In conventional landfills, this settlement usually occurs after landfill closure when it is too late to use the space. By accelerating the decomposition process, new landfill space is created sooner, which may be reused for additional waste placement. Recycling valuable landfill space could extend the landfill life by 20%.

Environmental Control Systems' (ECS) aerobic landfill technology uses a patented process that stabilizes waste far faster than traditional anaerobic methods, thus minimizing risk, enhancing revenues and extending the life of the facility.

Rather than waiting for the organic compounds to degrade naturally, which can take up to 30 years, ECS treats the material by injecting air and moisture directly into the waste. Degradation takes place in just one to three years, and produces a non-toxic material that can be mined, recovered or reused. That, in turn, can free up an additional 80 to 90 percent of airspace, which eliminates the need for new permits and expansions and ensures a longer-lasting facility that generates more profits.

The City of Calgary has constructed a full-scale pilot project consisting of a 100,000 tonne cell, which will operate under anaerobic and aerobic conditions. The landfill maybe mined at a later date to recover space. A landfill in Ste-Sophie Quebec and the Laflèche landfill in Moose Creek Ontario also operate as bioreactors.

As you can see, Sudbury clearly suffers from a serious lack of logic, ambition and imagination, and as I said during my mayoral campaign, we cannot build what we cannot imagine; and imagination is what engineers the future. Sudbury can no longer afford to sit back and just polish yesterday's economic apple, or be involved in toothless projects; we must look beyond conventional recipes for business sustainability by planting new apple trees to grow a "wisdom economy" for our future.

"Ingenuity is unlimited," and Sudbury needs to push the frontiers of technology and become a pioneer in electricity technology. This is the very essence of learning to identify and create opportunities that spring from the emerging trends Lens; for the height of insanity is doing things the same way and expecting a different result.

We also know the threat posed by global warming and climate change. The question is: what are we doing about it?

We do much to prepare our children for the future, but are we doing enough to prepare the future for our children?

I believe we must do both.

When our descendants look back at the first part of the twenty first century, we want them to be able to say: "That's when they began to take the degradation of the natural environment seriously." And we would like them to be able to see that we took serious steps to halt and revere this process.

Thus, we are at "War with Waste" and if we fight the great fight we will change our world one trash can at a time! If we are to win this war and, if recycling is going to survive, and even prosper, we need to do more--much more than we are doing today. Recycling refers to the recovery of dry materials from the waste stream that can be incorporated into new uses, but waste prevention is an entirely different animal. "Zero waste" means not making the waste in the first place. The ideal situation is to create no waste at all; but that’s simply impossible to do. And although modern techniques can greatly reduce the risk of environmental damage, "no method" of waste disposal is entirely harmless to the environment.

To make the right environmental choices, we need to understand how our natural environment works, and how resources are affected by the things we do. How we produce energy, and how we consume it, are critical issues in today's world, as Climate change is tied to the way people use energy. As support of ecological awareness continues to grow, we can no longer be afraid to shatter norms and old school traditions; we must take a stand against outdated waste disposal methods and the outdated dream of blind over-consumption by "white picket fencers."

The cornerstone of my War on Waste strategy rests on principles that I call "Green Acres;" a groovy "Green Philosophy" of relationships which recognizes the importance of valuing renewable resources and a "menu of methods" that would establish a comprehensive "National Municipal Solid Waste Policy," with a mission of building bridges between climate, science, community and commodity; all of which makes "Enviro-$ense!"

Green Acres is the place to be...

In our society, waste and anything associated with waste carries a stigma. We waste opportunities; we waste time; we waste money; we waste an education; and we even waste our minds. Waste is certainly not something that is considered useful and, in the final analysis, not something with which we want to be or should be associated. But when it comes to "Solid Waste" that stigma doesn't apply. Canadian waste-management companies bring in 4.1 billion $ a year, and sales of recycled products bring in 336 million $ a year!

Sudbury was once known as a "wasteland" and it’s high time we regain that status; but this time, in a 21st century ”Green Acres” state-of-the-practice fashion. Today, "Green" is going mainstream and by becoming the new "Green Giant" Sudbury would rise to the top by taking a leadership role in the challenge of a cleaner environment while making "progress profitable!" With a firm commitment to a healthier, safer environment without sacrificing performance, Sudbury would begin producing “Green Waste Watt” electricity and start manufacturing and marketing the "Green Acres" line of environmentally safe products; and all products would bear the government's "Green Seal" of approval.

So, here are some “outside the white picket fence” "eco-options" from my "Waste-ology Lab" and a detail-oriented encyclopedic like blueprint and "ecologically business plan" sure to clean up the environment and make "$udbury Green and Famou$." To achieve this victory, we need to understand technology with a depth of maturity that Canadians have never shown before. Thus, what is needed to pass the Northern Life and Sudbury Star front page test is a greater understanding about recycling and incinerators.

Recycling begins in the mind, and, importantly, incinerating garbage is a form of recycling. In Ontario, garbage disposal is a burning question. In much of the rest of the world it's just a matter of burning. Canadians do manage to recycle 40% of our garbage, though, sometimes quite creatively. One reason: Trash is big business; and business is good!

The terms reuse and recycle have specific meanings, but they are often confused, switched, and misused, especially in commerce, but in short; Recycle, why waste a good thing! Also keep in mind the concept of "cycle" in the term "recycle". You “close the loop” when you buy items or packaging made from recycled materials. They have now come full-circle: from bag or bin to a manufacturer, to the store shelf, and back to your home. And after using the item, you can start the loop again by saving it for the local recycling program. When you buy recycled, markets are created and a use is assured for recyclables being collected in your community and in thousands of others. Manufacturers will respond by continuing to use recyclables in their products.

“Incineration” is a generic term that encompasses a wide range of options that differ markedly in technology, economics and environmental impact. Mass burn is typically a low efficiency approach. While it eliminates large amounts of refuse, little energy is recovered. Incineration techniques have become more effective and the resulting emissions of hazardous substances to the atmosphere are far better controlled than they were in the 1980s. In Sweden, for example, the amount of waste delivered to incineration plants has doubled since the 1980’s, whereas the energy extraction has increased four-fold while stringent clean air regulations are being met.

“Waste-to-Energy” (WtE) or “Energy-from-Waste” (EfW) in its strictest sense refers to any waste treatment that creates energy in the form of electricity or heat from a waste source that would have been disposed of in landfill, also called “Energy Recovery (ER).” Every 700 megawatts produced replaces eight million barrels of oil and powers 700,000 homes.

The modern Waste to Energy facilities which are being built today are marvels of both engineering and architecture. As energy prices continue to escalate, our Waste to Energy plant would be a welcome alternative.

The meaning of the term “waste” can be changed over time. In the natural world, there is no such thing as waste. Nature efficiently recycles materials through a very complex ecological process. Our industrial processes have not yet been developed to this level of efficiency or complexity.

“Waste is the result of industrial societies organized as open systems operating in a predatory mode with respect to their environment. The word "waste", through Old French g(u)ast, comes from the Latin vastus which originally meant an uninhabited and uncultivated expanse of land (as in the English vast), that nowadays we call wilderness or, more ideologically, the environment.

By extension the word meant land that had been rendered uncultivated and uninhabited or sparsely populated as a result of war, or predatory use, which we now call environmental degradation. By further extension, in the eighteenth century, the word waste took as well the meaning of a superfluous and lavish abundance of something and, a century later, the meaning of worthless surplus material; such as the extra sheets of good but now worthless paper left after a printing run.

It is only in comparatively recent times, essentially towards the beginning of the industrial revolution, that the word came to mean the useless products of any industrial process from which no further economic value can be generated and, that therefore, must be rejected somewhere in a waste land, a tip, or a dump, nowadays commonly referred to as a landfill.

Waste produced by the domestic, industrial and commercial sectors of the community can be broadly classified into two streams: Solid Wastes and Liquid Wastes. This Portal file examines the potential for energy generation from both streams. In addition, gaseous by-products of industries associated with the extraction and refining of fossil fuels and minerals are also used to produce energy, yielding both financial and environmental benefits. Heat, another by-product of many industrial processes, can also represent a pollutant when released into the environment.

In some instances there is the potential for some of this heat to be captured and "recycled" to increase process efficiency, or it may be profitably used for local heating needs, or even converted into electricity for on-site use, such as in fertilizer manufacturing plants or Waste to Energy Plants.

Wastes include: sewage sludge and effluent; animal wastes; food processing residues; and industrial effluents. “Gaseous” wastes include: methane from coal mining, oil refining, landfills and industrial waste gases. In Simple Words; solid wastes are any discarded, abandoned or considered waste-like materials. Solid wastes can be solid, liquid, semi-solid or containerized gaseous material.

A material is discarded if it is abandoned by being: disposed of; burned or incinerated, including being burned as a fuel for the purpose of recovering usable energy; or accumulated, stored or physically, chemically or biologically treated (other than burned or incinerated) instead of or before being disposed of. A material is disposed of if it is: Discharged, deposited, injected, dumped, spilled, leaked or placed into or on any land or water so that such material or any constituent thereof may enter the environment or be emitted into the air or discharged into groundwater or surface water.

Now the reason it is extremely profitable to wring out waste is that there is quite an astonishing amount of it. Indeed in the North American economy, the material that we extract from the planet, that we mobilize for economic purposes, that process, move around and ultimately dispose of, totals about 20 times your body weight per person per day. So worldwide this resource flow is in the order of a half-trillion tonnes per year!

And what happens to all this material?

Well, only about 1% of it ends up in durable goods while the rest becomes waste. Our economic system is about 99% pure waste; and that’s a business opportunity knocking!

And when opportunity knocks; you open the door!

Sudbury has two 400 foot tall smoke stacks called "Twin Stacks." The stacks were built in 1928 and decommissioned after the 1247 foot tall Superstack was built in 1972. The "Twin Stacks Recycled Comeback" could create a massive "Eco-Industrial Science Park" consisting of 2 to 4, or more, "21st century State-of-the-Art Mega-Wattage Waste to Energy Incinerator Power Plants" that would green up the country and turn down the earth's thermostat by eliminating landfills and Greenhouse Gas emissions in several cities.

Our Twin Stacks are 4 to 5 times higher than stacks currently used in most incinerator applications, which would ensure emissions dispense over a greater distance. All new WtE plants must meet strict emission standards, hence, modern WtE plants are vastly different from incinerators of the past. On a burn versus bury basis, incinerators are the "engine of ingenuity" and the "ultimate wisdom" of recycling.

The former Twin Stack smelter's vast empty surrounding space and industrial location is the ideal place and drawing card for this Waste to Energy "Green Acres" business cluster venture. Business clustering involves having geographic concentrations of interdependent competitive firms and projects in related industries. Sudbury needs a cluster of firms and projects in order to bring to fruition a new and large-scale infrastructure of economic development.

Sudbury is geographically located 250 miles north of the already "taxed" smog filled air zone of Southern Ontario, and also near the geographical centre of Canada by road or rail.

The city has two Trans Canada Highways and both national railways passing through it and, without doubt, Sudbury is the "Crossroads of Canada;" something no other city can claim. One of the Trans Canada Highways is a mere one mile away from this former smelter while the other Trans Canada Highway bypass is 3 miles away. CP rail line is less than one half mile away.

Europe generating approximately 1.8 billion tonnes of waste per year. North America produces enough trash each day to fill 70,000 garbage trucks. Americans generated 236 million tons of garbage in 2003, about 4.5 pounds per person, per day, and roughly 130 million tons went to landfills; enough to cover a football field 703 miles high with garbage.

Canadians produce more garbage per person than just about any other country in the world. Garbage is a huge by-product of our general over-consumption. In Ontario, we produce about 13 million tonnes a year. The average person in Ontario generates a whole tonne of trash per year! On average, each person generates approximately 2.7 kg (or 5.95lbs) of garbage each day. Each year, after recycling, Ontario sends approximately 10 million tonnes of waste to landfills.

Ontario currently has just one "Energy from Waste" (EfW) facility in Brampton, although Kirkland Lake generates electricity by the incineration of waste largely composed of wood debris. There are over 10,000 landfills in Canada, and, together, Canadians produce more than 31 million tonnes of garbage each year. Picture 31 million average family cars piled on top of each other; that is roughly how much garbage Canadians produce.

Rather than looking at our production systems as one way and linear, we can redesign them to be cyclical, as in nature, where there is no such thing as “waste” and materials are kept in the production cycle.

Continued after jump...

[Max]

Garbage and Sewage Sludge are "economic commodities" and WtE plants work very much like coal-fired power plants; but burns much cleaner. The difference is the fuel. Waste to Energy plants use garbage—not coal—to fire an industrial boiler.

The same steps are used to make electricity in a WtE plant as in a coal-fired power plant: (1) The fuel is burned, releasing heat. (2) The heat turns water into steam. (3) The high-pressure steam turns the blades of a turbine generator to produce electricity. (4) A utility company sends the electricity along power lines to homes, schools, and businesses. Incinerators burn waste at high temperatures and the heat is used to generate steam. Steam can then drive electric turbines &/or heat water for a district heating scheme. Where both forms of energy are produced, this is known as a combined heat and power (CHP) scheme.

The steam generated by incineration energy is expanded in the turbines, producing electricity. Then it passes through the heat exchanger of the district heating system, where it is heating the water to 80°C–115°C while condensing. In a closed cycle, the water flows back to the incineration heat exchanger and is transformed to steam again. For every 200,000 tonnes of waste incinerated, 145,000 MWh of electrical energy and 540,000 MWh of district heating are produced.

Trucks &/or trains deliver garbage to the "tipping floor" where garbage is sorted. After incineration waste is reduced to blocks of dense cooled ashes. Incinerators reduce overall volume of waste by up to 90% and mass waste by 75%. The plant uses natural gas and burns garbage to produce steam that drives a turbine generator to produce electricity. About ¼ of the power is used to run in-plant needs with the rest being sent to the power grid. As mentioned, Sudbury already owns GSHi who already owns a "Smart Power Grid."

Modern incinerators burn garbage at extreme high temperatures and use pollution control devices to limit emissions. Pollution controlled devices use sophisticated air pollution control technology and highly skilled workers with engineering degrees run them, so many of these jobs are very high paying. Certified plant operators must also keep up with the frequent changes in State-of-the-Art technologies and regulations.

Gases are treated in three stages before they are emitted through a stack, and this is called point source pollutants. A filter removes poisonous particles and a Catalytic Reduction stage destroys dioxins and petroleum like substances, and all emissions would be well within provincial pollution standards.

It takes 1 tonne of garbage compared to 1/4 tonne of coal to produce the same amount of energy. However one tonne of garbage burns much cleaner than ¼ tonne of coal, thus garbage is a cleaner stream of fuel. A barrel of oil costs as much as 70 $. A tonne of garbage generates as much electricity as a barrel of oil; and Ontario is a veritable Middle East of garbage, pumping out 13 million tonnes a year. Therefore, you can think of garbage as a mixture of energy-rich fuel.

Burning one tonne of trash thus avoids mining a quarter tonne of coal or importing or producing one barrel of oil. Taking into account both of these factors means that WtE plants reduces GHG emissions by an estimated 2.8 tonnes of carbon dioxide per tonne of trash burned.

Ontario's total annual electricity consumption was 151 billion kWh in 2006. Ontario emits 203 milltion tones (megatonnes or MT) of greenhouse gases per year; 28% of the national total. To meet Kyoto targets by 2012, it requires cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 30 per cent by 2020 relative to 1990 levels, and getting to 80 per cent reductions by 2050.

The current flurry of federal eco-spending announcements cannot paper over the lack of a national climate change plan or how the federal government's poor performance on the climate change file is jeopardizing both our international reputation and the environment.

No one is saying this will be easy. Ontario's greenhouse gas emissions come from our coal-fired electricity plants, from our cars and trucks, from heating our houses, from factories and farms. We are indeed "addicted" to fossil fuels, even though we know that burning them blankets the Earth with heat-trapping gases. And due to the lack of any real action to date, Ontario's emissions have grown 15 per cent since 1990.

However, we continue to lag behind our global competitors, including the U.S., Spain, Germany, Italy, France and even India, China and Panama in terms of our investment in renewable energy. Canada ranked only 11th in the Ernst & Young Renewable Energy Investment Attractiveness Index in Q3 2006. These countries invest in low-impact renewable energy because of its multiple environmental, social and economic benefits. They see beyond the fossil fuel era and want to ensure they have a mature and competitive renewable energy industry in place when the inevitable transition to renewable energy comes later this century.

The good news is that the faster that Ontario acts, the less it will cost. And given that our energy use is already much more wasteful than other industrialized countries like Germany, the U.K. and Japan that use half the energy per dollar of output that Canada does, many of the solutions will save us money as we burn less fossil fuel in more efficient homes, power plants, vehicles and workplaces.

If 15 of the 31 million tonnes of trash were combusted (the remaining 16 million tonnes recycled) we would produce 8 billion Kwh of electricity, greater than all other sources of renewable energy, and reduce Greenhouse Gas emissions by 42-million tonnes of carbon dioxide PER YEAR!

A WtE cogeneration plant with flue gas condensers can recover up to 98% of the energy from the waste it burns. Up to about 30% of that comes out as electricity, the rest as heat. This heat is usable as heat or it can be converted into chilled water using an absorption chiller, reducing strain on the grid in summer due to air conditioning load.

In 100 pounds of typical garbage, more than 90 pounds can be burned as fuel to generate electricity at a power plant. Those fuels include paper, plastics, and yard waste. A tonne of garbage generates about 525 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity, enough energy to heat a typical office building for one day. Burning 1500 tonnes a days produces enough electricity to power 28,000 homes. Burning 2250 tonnes of garbage a day generates 55 megawatts (MW) of electricity; and a megawatt is 1 million watts of power, enough to light at least 10 thousand light bulbs at the same time.

Currently, the largest garbage gulping incinerator in the world is capable of burning 4,500 tonnes a day. Having 4 megawatt incinerators, 2 in each twin stack, would accommodate garbage from up to 5 million people a day. There are 12.5 million people in Ontario, 8 million in Quebec and 1.2 million in Manitoba, our two next bed neighbours. Having 10 mass burn incinerators, 5 in each stack, would accommodate the entire province of Ontario, although more stacks may be needed. Typically, 3 funances can feed one stack.

Having 10 burners would allow one big burner in each stack to be shut down for maintenance on a rotating basis without interrupting our 24/7/365 production schedule. Since rural towns in Ontario might not provide garbage due to inconvenient delivery or costs, we can accommodate garbage from other provinces. Having 8 of the 10 big burners in service would produce roughly 880 megawatts of electricity per day, every day.

With 20 big burners in play, we would scale up to accommodate more trash and cash and wisely become the "Incineration Capital of the World." A twenty burner diet would digest all of Canada's garbage and produce some 1980 megawatts per day, with 2 of 20 burners shut down for servicing on a ongoing rotating basis. Eighteen mass burners would incinerate 81,000 tonnes or more per day and, with proper digestion, produce roughly 8 tonnes of ash per day.

Bear in mind, emissions do increase not only during start-ups, shutdowns, or upsets in combustion conditions, but also during periods of less-than-optimal performance resulting from lack of maintenance, or simply as a result of facility aging.

The ash represents only 10% by volume of the original garbage. Landfilled ash does not give off the potent smelly greenhouse gas methane the way rotting garbage does. If you actually look at it using science and measure, what comes out of ash, what comes out of garbage, what’s emitted from ash, what’s emitted from garbage, you’ll actually conclude that you’d rather sit next to an ash landfill than a garbage landfill. Sudbury is 37 miles long and 17 miles wide; and has no shortage of space to store 100 years worth of accumulated ash.

There is more information on ash later in this portal, but in the meantime while you’re pondering what 100 million tonnes of ash would look like consider how many hundreds of millions of tonnes of slag and other industrial waste CVRD Inco (Inco) has stored on their wee property over the past 100+ years and they haven’t run out of room nor does it interfere with our city life!

If all Ontario garbage--&/or all of Canada's major cities garbage--were sent to Sudbury we would become the Saudi Arabia of recycling. Becoming an “Extreme Green Guerilla" would turn Sudbury into a powerhouse “Green Volt WasteWatt"" electricity producer. This extreme "Green" plan would create a "waste-based" energy producing manufacturing eco-economy.

Sudbury also has the oldest rock in North America, the "Sudbury Nickel Eruptive," which is located within the U-shaped "Cambrian Shield," also called the Precambrian Shield, Laurentian Shield, Bouclier Canadien (French), or Laurentian Plateauand, and a rock-faced "Mount Trashmore Monument" with my face on it could be constructed to recognize Sudbury's "eco-efficient "Green Status."

Additionally, or in the alternative, we need to get our architecturally designed WtE on a Canadian stamp! And I’m not kidding you about that one! There are 5 Power Plants on stamps in other countries. Our 21st century architecturally designed humanistic "WasteWatt Power Plant" will be the first in Canada!

Five hundred Waste to Energy facilities can be found from Sweden to Spain and from Britain to Hungary, as it's illegal to landfill anything combustible in most of Europe. Sweden has been a leader in using the energy generated from incineration over the past 30 years.

This State-of-the-Art incinerator near Malmo, Sweden, supplies 40 per cent of the city's electricity and heat.

Japan has 193 WtE Power Plants while the rest of Asia have many more. Today, in the U.S., there are 98 WtE plants in 29 states that generate enough electricity to supply almost 3 million households. In fact, Americans throw away enough wood and paper every year to heat 5 million homes for 200 years. The largest WtE plant in the U.S. is located in Detroit, a mere 400 air shed miles from Sudbury. The plant handles 4,000 tonnes a day and 3 furnaces operate using 1 smoke stack.

Currently there are only 8 major municipal incinerators operating in the United Kingdom. These treat just 7% of the Country's municipal solid waste. In comparison to Europe this is very poor. For example, Switzerland and Belgium incinerate over 50% of their municipal solid waste, France, Sweden and Denmark over 40%, and the Netherlands and Norway over 30%.

Nothing speaks as eloquently as an example, and these WtE plants are proof that such plants do work well. European cities such as Amsterdam and Vienna have such advanced garbage incinerators that you can walk by them in a central neighbourhood and not realize what they are. We need to copycat this trend-true low carbon economy and earth-worthy direction, for in ecological terms; our sacred lands just can't afford another century like the past one.

All Ontario garbage would be trucked in while the rest of Canada's garbage would come by rail. Sudbury is starving for jobs and this "Green Acres" Philosophy would create "a pathway out of poverty” by producing over 2000+ new "Green Collar" jobs, not to mention free electricity. Toronto sends some 100+ trucks a day to Michigan and that alone is 100 truck driver jobs. Overall, there would be 1400+ jobs in transportation. In 2005, Ottawa produced enough garbage to fill 25,000 transports. Hamilton did the same. Toronto is 5 times the size of Ottawa! These three cities would produce 175,000 transport loads full of of garbage.

Reverse supply chain logistics--which means back-hauling products--would return "Made in Sudbury" finished goods manufactured from recycled waste to markets instead of sending trucks back empty, which reduces manufacturer transportation costs. Spin off jobs would be created in the truck fleet management, maintenance and service industry, while plant construction jobs would be in the hundreds.

All cities would pay us "tipping fees" to take their garbage, and current fees range from 40 to 100 $ per tonne; and fees at some southern Ontario metro dumps are now $150 a tonne. When seen from this prospective; "one man's garbage is definitely another man's Gold." By turning "Garbage into Gold," this is venture would produce "Real Gold" not "Fools Gold," and ensure that the waste isn’t, well, a total waste.

This scheme is a pathway to not only yielding environmental gains but also economic success.

A trash incinerator is the only kind of power station which gets paid to accept the fuel it burns! And with local construction and demolition (CD) materials becoming part of the incoming material stream, we get more infeed fuel for free! Recovering the Btu value of it is a tremendous step above sending it to a landfill.

To operate at peak efficiency, the combustors need to be fed constantly and run 24 hours a day, seven days a week; hence, they thrive on waste. To feed their addiction they need waste; they demand waste, and they love “getting wasted” on “refuse-derived fuel;” otherwise the burners are “starving for trash.” In order to incorporate a guaranteed “flow control," cities sign what is called a "put-or-pay" agreement. These commit communities to deliver a prescribed amount of waste to the incinerator each day, week, month or year, at a fixed rate, and should they fail to do so they have to pay the scheduled amount anyway.

Thus, with capital guaranteed, input guaranteed, and market for output guaranteed; building an incinerator and turning trash into treasure is one of the least risky, most subsidized, guaranteed business venture in the world!

It pays to have "enviro-vision" and an "eco-magination. I have it, and Sudbury needs to immediately become an "eco-holic" by turning these "wastes into resources." Moreover, we’re in the midst of World War IV; the War on Waste. We are in a serious “waste race" with other communities; for it's just a matter of time before some next bed neighbour wises up and adopts this idea and all the jobs along with it.

And, if you're even half as much an "eco-geek" as I am, you’d already know that this is not dirty tech; this "energy recovery scheme" is the future of "Green Tech." Taking even just a percentage of Ontario's landfill-destined “waste stream" and converting it into "value-added products" and "smart heat" would be "eco-topia!"

For example, Covanta Energy’s WtE plant in Hempstead, on Long Island NY, burns about 900,000 tonnes of garbage a year, and creates electricity to run the plant, and power 65,000 homes. There are some 73,000 residential units in Sudbury and over 8 million tonnes of gold (trash) within a 4 hour radius of Sudbury that right now nobody wants!

Can we really afford another missed "golden" opportunity for our city!

The plant would cost 1 billion to 2 billion $ to build, and more, if 20 big burners were installed. Toronto just wasted 220+ million $ buying the mammoth Green Lane “megafill” site near London Ontario, and that money could've, and should've went into this project.

Toronto decided to defile a farming community by both increasing a landfill and increasing truck traffic from a few to a constant stream as they trundle their garbage along farming roads, pumping diesel fumes and noise into the air, and compounding the traffic problems along suicide alley. The leachate from this landfill will seep into agricultural land, the very land that feeds us. The methane gas the landfill emits will pollute their air and increase greenhouse gases.

Meanwhile, Premier McGuinty wants to spend "40 billion $" on nuclear energy, which creates a dangerous lifetime supply of nuclear waste, next to no new jobs, and zero jobs in the north.

Nuclear plants will, in effect, block the development of safe, green energy. McGuinty fails to mention our current fleet of aging reactors cost Ontario ratepayers twice what they were promised to cost and lasted half as long. He shrugs off the 350,000 people displaced by the Chernobyl nuclear accident as if they are a fluke not to be repeated and bizarrely holds up the near catastrophic melt down at Three Mile Island nuclear plant as some virtuous success of the technology.

According to him, we shouldn't sweat creating more radioactive nuclear waste because our children's generation will figure out how to deal with it. But solving climate change with nuclear generation is akin to curing cancer with the plague. Nevertheless, we know the province has 40 billion $ to spend on energy production and this project would cost no where near that.

The federal government has "billions" to spend on fighting Greenhouse Gas. This project would provide the best bang for its buck! Menhane gas is 24.5 times more powerful than CO2 as a GHG. We'd wipe out 42+ million tonnes of it with this mother of all net energy producing idea!

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Italy - This plant won the best in the world in 2006

A third party "could" operate our WtE plant and would also make a financial investment reducing start up costs. This third party would also become a major ratepayer to Sudbury's tax roll.

Acquiring "smart garbage" would also require the government to complete the four-lanes of Highway 69 to Toronto sooner rather than later due to the increased truck traffic. The incinerator could produce enough ash to back fill the construction! Ontario is also in need of electricity, and not only would we close every leaky stinky landfill, but Hydro One would also receive a portion of the hydro we produce.

The province(s) and cities could eliminate recycling education and recycling programs and apply those funds to this project and the tipping fees we would charge. Recycling is a good thing, but it costs money. Money that could go for road resurfacing or social programs is being absorbed by increasing disposal costs.

Once the waste to energy plant is up and running the methane gas being produced at the Kingsway Landfill could be converted into compressed Natural Gas (CNG) to fuel light and heavy-duty vehicles like our city transit! Vehicles powered by CNG offer several environmental benefits, including reduced noise levels and cleaner emissions compared to diesel powered vehicles. CNG powered vehicles also have 40 to 50% lower maintenance costs!

Other "eco-fusion-options" is a Plasma Converter System that seems like something right out of "The Jetsons:" plasma, vaporization, temperatures 3 times hotter than the Sun!

It works a little like the big bang, only backward--you get nothing from something. You put the waste in the reactor and you get out the syngas. That’s it. There's no smoke, no flames, no ash, no pollution of any kind—all that’s left is syngas, the fuel source, and the molten obsidian-like material. Waste destruction at the speed of lightning with energy to share!

With 20 of these systems we could accommodate 146 million tonnes a year and zap all of Canada’s solid waste, medical waste and human sewage! Gasification is not just environmentally friendly, it’s a good business decision.

Startech isn’t the only company using plasma to turn waste into a source of clean energy. A handful of start-ups—Geoplasma, Recovered Energy, PyroGenesis, EnviroArc and Plasco Energy, among others—have entered the market in the past decade. But Longo, who has worked in the garbage business for four decades, is perhaps the industry’s most passionate founding father.

Plasma is simply a gas (air) that the Converter ionizes so it becomes an effective electrical conductor and produces a lightning-like arc of electricity that is the source of the intense energy transferred to the waste material as radiant energy. The arc in the plasma plume within the vessel can be as high as 30,000 degrees Fahrenheit.

When waste materials are subjected to the intensity of the energy transfer within the vessel, the excitation of the waste's molecular bonds is so great that the waste material's molecules break apart into their elemental components (atoms). It is the absorption of this energy by the waste material that forces the waste destruction and elemental dissociation. The Plasma Converter is computer controlled, easy to use and operates at normal atmospheric pressure, very safely and quietly.

This system can safely and economically destroys wastes, no matter how hazardous or lethal. In doing so, the system protects the environment and helps to improve the public health and safety.

The System achieves closed-loop elemental recycling to safely and irreversibly destroy Municipal Solid Waste, organics and inorganics, solids, liquids and gases, hazardous and non-hazardous waste, industrial by-products and also items such as "e-waste," medical waste, chemical industry waste and other specialty wastes while converting many of them into useful commodity products that can include metals and a synthesis-gas called Plasma Converted Gas (PCG)™.

Among the many commercial uses for PCG, it can be used to produce "green power electricity," Gas To Liquid (GTL) fuels such as ethanol, synthetic diesel fuel and other higher alcohol fuels. Hydrogen, for use and sale, can also be separated from the PCG synthesis gas mixture. Startech is the only publicly traded Waste to Energy plasma arc technology company in the world. They have three 5 ton/day installations in operation, with a number of other plants in various stages of implementation. A 200 ton/day plant being built in Panama and will be the largest such plant in the world.

Another "eco-fusion-option" is the biomass gasification process that pours hot sand over ground-up materials that are no bigger than a softball. The sand pours over that surface area, rapidly heats that biomass and converts it to a gas that is substitutable for natural gas. There are no emissions from this process.

Unsorted garbage is dumped into a sorting machine that rips the green bags open, and chops the trash into smaller pieces. The garbage is fed onto conveyer belts which take the material to a sorting machine. Magnets pull out metals and push out aluminum.

What's left goes in stages through three large, enclosed tanks. Over a period of 40 days, anaerobic bacteria metabolize paper and food scraps and converts them into a soup of smaller molecules, which is then fermented into methane and carbon dioxide by other anaerobic organisms.

What's left, after the methane and carbon dioxide have been siphoned off, are particles of glass, plastic and fine particles of peat that look like coffee grounds. The material is put through a fine screen that filters out the glass and plastic for recycling.

The peat-like material goes through a final process to remove the heavy metals. Subbor executives say that for every 100 kilograms of garbage that goes through the process, 50 kilograms of biogas, 30 kilograms of recycled glass and metals and 20 kilograms of high-grade peat are produced. Subbor is "Canadian tech" and has a plant up and running in Guelph.

Having a combination of systems would be ideal. The biomass gasification process would produce the natural gas needed to operate the WtE plant; we would have a completely self sustaining operation. However, this system is a 40-day process and not suitable as our only source of ridding earth of the large volumes of garbage that we would be handling.

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[Max]

The anti-growth, status quo defender or skeptical "trash talking" reader might challenge my hypothesis, but the reality is that incineration has been giving a bad rap by undereducated people, "hardcore eco-groupies" and the Greens environmentalists who rely on paradigms, myths and metaphors.

The best way to recognize a myth is to put yourself into a world in which it's not believed. For example; every grass root reformer will tell you that industrial business emissions are causing global warming; but ask any anti what industrial business emissions were responsible for melting the ice that covered Canada during the ice age 10,000 years ago?

Global warming is real, not a "myth;" and it has been real since time began, but industrial business nor humanity is responsible for global warming. "Regional warming" and "global dimming" maybe, but not global warming. Earth has experienced 16 ice ages in the past 4.5 billion years and humanity was not responsible for any of these global warming and global cooling periods, since man didn't exist; a fact everyone seems to ignore.

Environmentalists have traditionally been hostile towards business and much environmental argument is characterized as anti-growth, anti-business, and anti-profit. Responses to environmental concerns is often been portrayed as imposing a brake upon development and innovation, thus increasing business costs and undermining competitiveness, jobs and living standards.

Sudbury has 161,000 citizens, a 5% unemployment rate, upwards of 8,000 on welfare, thousands on disability, over 13,000 using a food bank, and 60% of the workers make less than 10 $ a hour. Meeting the dual demands of smart growth and lower taxes hinges on generating "virgin revenue" sources, and making Sudbury more multifaceted in the "tech and non-tech economies" is the key to unlocking a more prosperous era and the formula for retaining our youth and professionals.

This is not to suggest that I am unsympathetic to environmental concerns, because I am; I am an amateur environmentalist, and this is an "eco-efficient ”Green Friendly” industrial business" that I wish to champion for our city, province and country. I would love nothing more than to put all land-hogging raw waste landfills out of business by "starving them to death."

Quite frankly we're in the “Stone Age” when it comes to waste management. We don’t put garbage in the lakes because it’s not a good idea. Putting garbage in the land so nasty chemicals can seep into the groundwater then enter our lakes while methane gas emissions emerge from landfills is not a good idea either.

How much prime land has been permanently poisoned by landfills is unknown. Worse may be where the seepage runoff is ending up. That we do know. Virtually all of it eventually flows into the lakes from which we draw our drinking water; so why would any one question such an obvious politically correct solution?

People often refer to incineration as a source of dioxins, and they're right. But let's put things in perspective. In Sweden there are 30 incineration plants; and the total amount of dioxins released this year is 0.7 of a gram. And that's for the entire country. And if the anti’s did some honest research they would also discover that European Union emission standards are much more stringent than anything we have in Canada. In addition, the EU and local governments levy heavy taxes on landfill to discourage exactly the kind of approach Canada advocates.

Dioxin is a carcinogen and one of the most toxic chemicals known, even at trace levels, or so the anti's say. However, you can be exposed to dioxin many ways, from a wood stove or even while you’re standing over a camp fire roasting a wiener or marshmallow. Dioxins also exist in nature as a result of coal and MSW combustion, metal production, natural forest fires and volcanoes activities.

Waste to Energy emissions produce less dioxin than a cement kiln, pulp and paper plant, metal smelting operation (i.e., Inco Xstrata), the incineration of medical waste, and a residential wood burning stove. In fact, WtE plants produces less posion than city council pumps out every second Wednesday.

It should be noted that even when dioxin emissions were ten times higher than they are now, there has not been a single recording of a person becoming ill or dying from dioxin poisoning in North America.

Apart form the Seveso (Italy) industrial chemical accident and the allegations regarding the use of Agent Orange in the Vietnam War, the only reported case of dioxin poisoning was recently when an undetermined quantity of dioxins was mixed in the food of Mr. Yushchenko, the current President of Ukraine. He has survived this attack.

Another argument against incineration is expense. Building one burner would cost lots, perhaps $300 million. But what they fail to understand is that WtE plants generate heat and electricity, both of which can be sold to consumers to make money.

The operations in Sweden actually turn a profit. The break-even point is 10 to 20 years. Building products made from recycled materials reduce solid waste problems, cut energy consumption in manufacturing and save on natural resource use. The science of reuse is solid.

People also complain that incineration discourages recycling. This is complete nonsense; as there's no evidence that people reduce, reuse or recycle any less because of incineration than they do because of landfills. Indeed, both Swedes and Canadians recycle approximately 40% of household waste. In Canada, the remaining 60% goes into the ground; in Sweden, it's burned--for profit. Talk about waste!

Sometimes the opposition to incinerators becomes just pure hysteria, you know, the “devil burns and the Lord recycles.” What a load of "Rubbish!" In Greek mythology, fire was a gift of the Gods! Thanks to the “world’s window on waste” we now know that investment into waste management technologies that are safe, clean, ”Green” and run on its own generated renewable energy is the way forward to a more sustainable environment while protecting public health.

Those who stir up people and create all this fear just don't understand the technology. Objections to it are based on information that's 30 years out of date. These incinerators have been "laboratory pilot tested," "internationally patented," "scientifically baptized," and safely used throughout the world for over 35 years; so the force of logic prevails.

Incinerator inefficiencies are simply rich in myth and its slippery Canadian ally, tradition. Some people say incinerators are a "cash-burning plant," or a "waste-of-energy" facility not a "waste-to-energy" facility; however, again, many cities and countries have been busy proving the skeptical hardcore eco-groupies wrong.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Sweden

One of the most abused aspects of incinerators use by skeptics is that the air will become a cesspit like atmosphere; but myths are not basis for policy and a good dose of reality might be better.

The air shed does not have a border and incinerators within our air zone are used in Montreal, Brampton, Kirkland Lake, Michigan, New York State, Maine, Connecticut, Virginia, West Virginia, Massachusetts, Illinois, Indiana, Pennsylvania, New Jersey Wisconsin, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maryland, North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa, Rhode Island, Delaware and Minnesota; so the "inconvenient truth" for anti's is that incinerator emissions do not require a passport to enter our airspace and emissions are already in the "great aerial ocean" that surrounds us all.

Minneapolis St. Paul Minnesota has 1000 lakes and no side effects from their incinerator, thus, incinerators have proven their "Green Credentials."

Hamilton Ontario used an incinerator until recently and now has a major odour problem coming from their landfill. Energy recovery from "landfill to energy" scheme produces only one fifth of the energy per tonne of waste than incineration with energy recovery. Energy from Landfills schemes do not achieve volume reduction of waste; incineration does. It also takes 25 years or more to recover "only some" of the methane from a landfill site, whereas the energy from incineration is recovered immediately.

Moreover, the mercury and dioxin standards for WtE plants are far more stringent than those for coal-fired or high-sulfur-content oil-fired power plants, and both coal and oil-fired plants are everywhere in the U.S.; and their emissions are also already in our air shed. The U.S. projects that 35 billion $ will be spent to construct new municipal incinerators over the next ten years.

Importantly, every major city in Ontario, and elsewhere, already cremates humans, pets and medical waste and no one is calling for a ban. One quarter of the toxic emissions causing global warming derive from the transportation sector and cars are doing more damage than business, and no one is calling for a ban on cars.

Information failure is causing needless unemployment and mistakes in scientific assessment have played a major role in the collapse of some potentially sustainable harvesting systems. For example, when Canada took over the extended fish stock management of the 200-mile fishing jurisdiction off the East Coast in the 1977 "scientists" overestimated the remaining cod stocks off Newfoundland by over 200%. This led to a Canadian policy that virtually destroyed the cod stock by 1991.

In the past century, without much thought about the consequences, we have removed from the sea literally billions of tonnes of living creatures of wildlife and added to it billions of tonnes of toxic substances. We have a hard time thinking of fish as valuable unless they're dead and our accounting system regards these things as free. True, too, for our sacred land and trees that we are poisoning with landfills.

There is no monitoring or prevention method occurring to stop the seepage of other nasty co<ktail of chemical liquids and heavy metals, like mercury, that are right now leaking and contaminating the surrounding environment, such as our groundwater system. This is called a non-point source pollutant. Landfill seepage can pollute ground water for up to 100 years and this chemical co<ktail soup is seeping swiftly south, i.e., underground; sight unseen.

Mercury is a metal that occurs naturally in the environment in several forms. The most common form, metallic or elemental, is a silvery, odorless liquid. That is the form commonly found in household thermometers. Elemental mercury can evaporate at room temperature to form a vapor. Mercury can escape to the environment when items containing mercury are broken or thrown away. Whether the items are dumped in sewers, garbage cans or burned, some of the mercury will eventually enter the atmosphere.

Mercury is a pollutant in the air emissions from activities such as burning coal. A number of other possible sources of mercury exist, including cement plants and gasoline combustion and in many consumer products and devices. Mercury can also combine with other elements to form both inorganic and organic compounds. Mercury and mercury compounds can be found in air, soil and water.

Exposure to high levels of metallic, inorganic or organic mercury can damage the nervous system and kidneys. Studies have shown that people who ate fish and grain which contained large amounts of methylmercury had permanent damage to the nervous system and kidneys. Exposure to methylmercury is more of a concern for children and unborn babies because their nervous systems are still developing and the nervous system is a target organ for mercury. Health effects might include brain damage, behavioral and developmental problems. Mercury is extremely dangerous and it is right now seeping into our groundwater in over 10,000 landfills in Canada!

The atmosphere can absorb and cleanse itself of Greenhouse Gases, as history has proven, but our watersheds are not self-cleansing, thus we will save our world by saving our watersheds.

Landfill emissions are not being monitored and by eliminating materials from going into landfills we would eliminate future landfill methane gas emissions. Eliminating landfills would also reduce smell, flies, seagulls, rats, bears and disease. Land filling should be limited only to non-recyclable and non-combustible materials, as it does not make any sense to destroy sacred lands with garbage, and therefore; it's time to clean up our logic.

Interestingly, without some greenhouse gases in our atmosphere the surface of the earth would be about 30 degrees Celsius cooler than it is today, making human life impossible, thus trace amounts of greenhouse gases serve to raise the temperature of the earth’s surface and make it habitable. With absolutely no greenhouse gas earth would return to a cosmic snowball, thus, GHG in our atmosphere is the very reason life on earth exists.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Japan

Greater emphasis is now needed on the "Greening of Business" and this is achieved through cooperation; not confrontation. The aim of development is to achieve a state of systems equilibrium based upon environmental soundness, economic feasibility and social acceptability. In a well-designed collaboration, participants bring needed resources and cover the spectrum of knowledge about the ecological health of the planet.

It is obvious that radical changes are urgently needed in the processes of waste management to curb pollution damage to our economically valuable air and land assets, since our land is not a garbage sink. This "Green Acres" Philosophy is an environmentally oriented project, and we would not be burning metals, batteries human waste or much rubber and plastic, which produce high heating values needed in the production of electricity, but which also produce mercury, PCBs dioxins and lead emissions. Chlorine from the paper and PVC plastics in garbage turns into hydrochloric acid which constantly erodes steel tubing, leading to needless annual boiler maintenance fees; so naturally we would not be burning it.

Waste to energy incinerators produce clean, reliable "renewable" power with less environmental impact than almost any other source of electricity! The incinerators do produce emissions but those emissions drift elsewhere, and while these emissions are nothing to ignore, it's no Chernobyl either.

Bio Cycle Magazine - Energy content of incinerating waste. Plastics - 32.8 mj/kg - Rubber - 26.0 mj/kg - Leather - 18.5 mj/kg - Paper - 15.8 mj/kg - Yard waste - 6.3 mj/kg - Food waste - 5.5 mj/kg - Glass and metal - 0.0 mj/kg

As a base level of performance, the plant must comply with strict legislation covering pollution control and the treatment and safe disposal of ash waste. This involves investment in end-of-the-pipe technologies that trap, treat and dispose of emissions. There would also be continuous air emissions monitoring on a website where the public can monitor emissions on a real-time 24/7 basis. Software could be employed to show trends graphically and compare ongoing test results to other model plants and to standards. Information about compliance tests and qualifications of operators would also be topics for communication.

A rigorous enforcement and "Right-To-Know" strategy would be cheaper to operate than a labour/paper intensive process of filing quarterly reports. A large electronic billboard could also be erected at the plant and continuous emissions data displayed so that the public could see the performance in real time.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Japan.

Sorting out the best way to run a recycling program requires governments and environmental citizens to pay attention to the three "R’s,” Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle. We’ve all had the delightfully alliterative “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” axiom drilled into our heads, and yet most of us seem to give just that third ‘R’ all the attention. However, the "Green Acres" Philosophy calls for a 4th, 5th and 6th "Rainbow" of “R's.” "Recover energy, Recoup investment and Retention of landfills." These are the three missing links in the field of waste management.

Recycling today is no longer a fad for the fashionable few. Recycling is not, however, "automatically superior," as a matter of either economics or morality, to the process of manufacturing a product from original raw material. Most of the substances that are commonly recycled--aluminum, steel, glass, some paper and plastic--have some value when delivered in pure form to a manufacturing plant. The problem is that for most substances this value is not great because the ordinary raw materials used to make these substances are plentiful and cheap.

Today, governments already require that products contain a percentage of recycled material, without regard to technical or economic realities. Yet imposing arbitrary quotas is a silly way to run anything. And unfortunately, the demand for postconsumer materials has often failed to keep pace with this boom in collection.

Perhaps the most pervasive misunderstanding among the public is that recycling is an environmentally benign process that in all cases saves resources. Recycling, however, is a manufacturing process like any other: Raw materials must be collected, prepared for processing, and manufactured into marketable goods. Although the process of recycling conserves some resources, it consumes others. Energy, water, and, often, chemical resources are all inputs in the recycling process, and inevitably, this manufacturing process results in some waste.

Despite the defects in the current recycling policies, governments are developing a whole new generation of misguided policies based on faulty premises, and all of these policies have serious fatal flaws.

Governments have citizens racked with "garbage guilt" and the system is creating a growing administrative apparatus that burdens both industry and consumers. Good news doesn't sell as well as bad news, though, and the "sky is falling" sensationalism of environmental activists lead people to falsely believe that our environment is getting worse when it's actually getting better.

Scare tactics and sensational rhetoric have enabled the top 30 organizations to generate billions in annual revenue. But how much of this money is spent on real, hands-on, "muddy boots" conservation work for the environment? Almost none.

Ontario’s mandatory blue box program is an example of municipal solid waste (MSW) management driven by government policy. It cannot be denied that Ontario’s blue box program has been a success in urban areas, where it now has the potential to divert recyclable materials from landfills. The decision-makers did not, however, consider the economic and environmental burden this program would represent for small isolated towns that previously managed MSW at much lower cost. The program also had the effect of promoting recycling at the expense of more environmentally friendly alternatives; such as incineration.

Indeed, it can be argued that promoting the blue box program as environmentally correct, while hiding its true costs in property taxes, has actually had the effect of increasing the production of single-use packaging materials.

Thus, if "Green" is the new "BLACK" $ then why are recycling programs running in the "RED"?

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Taiwan.

There’s a strong resemblance between colours but apparently we’re all colour-blind!

Society can derive many benefits from recycling, but only when it is pursued in an economically efficient manner. Policymakers should attempt to choose the waste management method that, on balance, is most cost-effective and efficient. To be sure, one must also consider the environmental impact of municipal solid waste management alternatives. In many circumstances, simply recovering the energy from packaging in a WtE incineration facility may be more economically efficient than recycling.

Mandated reproduced content requirements, however, prevent these and other "eco-options" from being considered by manufacturers or local solid waste officials.

Collecting, sorting, processing, and transporting trash is expensive, and the costs far exceed the value of the materials recovered. Many "eco-groupies" share the same fallacious premise that recycling is the only environmentally conscious way for the country to save scarce resources and avoid being buried in its own trash. The problem with this simplistic line of thinking is that it is based on common misconceptions about the need to recycle.

The first of these misconceptions is that Canada is running out of safe and secure places for landfills. This notion is simply unsupported. The reality is that there is no shortage of landfill space anywhere in this country. Ontario alone is over a million square kilometers in size--larger than Spain and France combined! Difficulty in siting landfills has less to do with a lack of geologically safe locations than with local opposition. However, municipalities that expand recycling programs must cut other programs or raise taxes to subsidize the effort.

The overall processes take more energy to produce recycled products than it does to dispose of them in traditional landfill methods. Curbside collection of recyclables is often done by a second waste refuse truck in addition to the truck that picks up the regular trash, thus curbside recycling programs require more trash pickups per week. Therefore, collecting waste has an impact on the environment.

Every truck transporting wastes burns non-renewable fuel and produces emissions that contribute to global warming and urban smog. The more wastes we generate, the more trucks we need to collect them and the more emissions we produce; and this is occurring in every city across the country. Thus, the sole benefit of reducing landfill space is trumped by the energy needed and resulting pollution from the current recycling process.

And some of you may've noticed that some plastics have a recycling symbol on them even though they can't be recycled. The recycling industry has been butting heads with the plastics industry over this misleading practice, but unfortunately with no results. The symbol is meant to indicate the type of plastic, not its recyclability. Next to no one realizes this and they are recycling items that cannot be recycled. These items are simply thrown back in the trash after being collected by the recycling companies.

These wastes are best dealt with using waste to energy technologies, including incineration. Is it more environmentally-sound for recycle trucks to burn diesel fuel hauling non-recyclable materials around only to be thrown back in the trash, when they could've been incinerated locally for energy production in the first place?

Therefore, the current recycling programs operating across the country are Garbage!

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in France.

However, under the "Green Acres"scenario, all garbage is be picked up by one waste truck and after one transfer it is delivered to one mega-recycling plant, where onsite manufacturers turn waste into finished product, then back haul goods to market. All non recyclables are incinerated and the ash is turned into a viable product. Nothing is "wasted!"

With up to 32 million Canucks providing a life time supply of garbage feedstock, which produces low-cost electricity for manufacturing, and, with a built in back hauling supply chain dynamic, this mega-recycling plant is a guaranteed winner and a clean, green, money-making machine!

• Cities across Canada would reduce emissions from trash collecting by half; by eliminating half of the current trucks collecting refuse, as all refuse is collected in a single sweep pass.

Currently GHG emissions for recycling is estimated at 33.6 kg CO2 per ton of recyclables collected. With the savings in mining new coal or oil for fuel and being replaced by trash fuel, and with the elimination of half of the collection trucks emissions; we would eliminate over 80 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emission EVERY year! The gas being harvested from the Kingsway landfill would be used as fuel for our city buses would further eliminate millions of tonnes more of GHG emissions!

• Waste collection expenditures, fuel, oil, trucks, wages, would be cut in half; since only half of the current trucks trips are needed to collect all refuse in a single sweep pass.

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[Max]

• With no need for curbside pre-sorting the collection of trash would be completely in a quarter of the time it currently takes.

• Conventional and economical rear packer refuse trucks can be used. Even the dual department rear packer mixed waste stream refuse trucks--half recyclables half garbage--are not as efficient as a full size refuse truck.

For example, landfill trash is not dropped off at the same place as recyclables. Thus when half of the truck becomes full a driver has to make a trip to dump the full half of the truck, either recyclables or trash, but he is only unloading half of the divided truck. Once he returns to where he left off and continues collecting refuse the other half of the divided truck becomes full and he has to make another trip to either the landfill or recycle depot to unload--half a truck. Thus vehicle compartments are not properly matched to the proportions of recyclables set out at the curb.

• Currently servicing high rise apartment building presents a challenge, and in many cases, recycling is not even occurring. This problem would now be solved and "all" garbage would be recycled.

• Cities would eliminate the need to fund and provide blue, black and green boxes; we would use bags. This saves more GHG emissions in the manufacturing of the boxes.

• Garbage bags do not fill up with snow like blue boxes do, which slows down the refuse collection process.

• Currently paper in blue boxes is being weighed down by rain water and snow, which means refuse trucks are using more fuel than necessary to carry around extra weight from the water soaked paper. Using bags keeps the paper dry which will result in less fuel being used by the trucks. Less fuel mean cost savings to the ratepayers and will eliminate even more GHG emissions when the less fuel is needed to be produced. Currently, Edmonton, Halifax, Guelph and Kelowna use bags for recyclables.

• All refuse would be picked up and delivered to the correct recycling center, unlike the non-recyclable plastics that are currently being picked up and not even being recycled.

• The ”Green Acres” philosophy eliminates the need for recycling centres everywhere and the capital cost associated therewith; i.e., balers, shredders, defensifiers, compactors, granulators, blowers, conveyors, weight scales, roll off containers, trailers, forklifts and front end loaders, snow removal, hydro, gas, phone, wages.

• It eliminates sorting, grading, and the processing of recyclables into a form suitable for market sale, i.e., size, weight, baling, removal of contaminants.

The current system is extremely inefficient and by cost shifting their waste management programs to this "Green Acres Hannibal the Can-able" " program cities would have a "zero increase" over current costs; and we’d all have a more efficient system and cleaner environment.

For any type of waste stream the most significant challenge to recycling is low tipping fees. With low tipping fees, the cost for disposal might be less than the cost to recycle, depending on location and any surcharge for contamination. This cost differential creates a significant disincentive to recycling.

Hauling costs are proportional to distance. As the distance increases, the cost to haul the material will also increase. Thus, if the recycling facility is too far away, the material will not be recycled due to cost. Similarly, if the distance to the end market is too far, recycling becomes uneconomical.

However our tipping fees would be for the most part offset by the current landfill tipping fees cities already pay. The greater amount of cities participating and providing garbage the lower the tipping fee charges could be. In fact, cities would eliminate recycling education programs to save money and come out on top in a cost-benefit analysis.

Local landfilling may very well be cheaper than WtE plants when a city’s waste has to be transferred long distances for incineration, however, when the "external" environmental costs are factored in, WTE is less expensive in all cases.

The constantly increasing use of land for landfilling is not sustainable, thus when comparing capital costs measured on the basis of per tonne of designed capacity, the economics of scale favour a large WtE facility, especially when a WtE plant can generate revenue from produced marketable products in addition to exporting energy to offsite energy users.

Therefore, "eco-worriers" are in need of a sweeping rethink about the "eco-nomics" of their recycling programs. Landfilling is "eco-enemy" #1, while current recycling programs are "eco-enemy" #2, especially if you're an "eco-minded Green thinker." Raw waste landfilling is "eco-suicide" and should be a “climate crime,” and for the “Love of the Earth" we need to starve landfills to death.

"Going Green is Great" and I would love to aid Canada in becoming a truly "Great Green Country!" Today, it is said that Canada has the most mature and sophisticated recycling system in the world, however, as we just witnessed, "this" is simply a myth.

A truly “Solid Waste Management” hierarchy would adopt and reinforce the focus away from landfilling and towards waste prevention, reduction, reuse, recycling, composting, biogas recovery and an energy from waste recovery system; in that order of priority. Rather that placing WtE on the same level as material recycling, it should be placed below recycling in a waste management hierarchy. Waste that is suitable for recycling or composting is recycled and composted, what cannot be recycled is processed using a WtE plant. Compost sells for $15/cubic yard in other cities.

The best solution is a combination of "zero waste," "precycling" i.e., strict packaging laws, "good sound sensible recycling programs," composting, "incineration," "biogas recovery production," and landfilling waste ash and non combustible trash. By following this scenario we would be connecting all kinds of "eco-cycle" dots and create a soild waste system for the 21st century.

Zero waste is a philosophy and a design principle for the 21st Century; it is not simply about putting an end to landfilling. Aiming for zero waste is not an end-of-pipe solution. That is why it heralds fundamental change. Aiming for zero waste means designing products and packaging with reuse and recycling in mind. It means ending subsidies for wasting. It means closing the gap between landfill prices and their true costs. It means making manufacturers take responsibility for the entire lifecycle of their products and packaging.

Zero waste efforts, just like recycling efforts before, will change the face of solid waste management in the future. Instead of managing wastes, we will manage resources and strive to eliminate waste. It’s the new age ecology.

Precycling is stopping waste before it happens. Preventing waste at its source. Reducing the amount of waste we produce, and in plain English; MAKING LESS GARBAGE!

As it is becoming more expensive to safely dispose of our wastes recycling helps, but it is not the whole solution! If we’re not precycling, we’re wasting resources!

For example as an environmental shopper we look for:

• No packaging.
• Buy in the bulk food section.
• Buy fruit & snacks loose instead of in packages.
• Bring your own canvas or reusable bags to the store.
• Look for minimal packaging.
• Look for concentrates.
• Buy larger sizes of products.
• Reusables and refillable packaging.
• Refillable milk & soda containers.

At Home.

Choose the reusable alternative to disposable products.

• A cloth towel instead of paper towels.
• A reusable razor instead of disposable ones.
• A mug instead of paper or plastic disposable cups.
• Washable plates or china instead of disposable plates.
• Cloth napkins instead of paper napkins.
• Rechargeable batteries instead of disposable batteries.
• Donate used clothing and appliances to charities.

At Work.

• Make double-sided copies.
• Circulate, instead of distributing individual copies of memorandums, letter and magazines.
• Periodically review mailing lists, remove duplicates
• Consolidate mailings whenever possible.
• Use E-mail whenever possible.
• Get off unwanted mailing lists.
• Bring reusable dishes, mugs/cups and silverware to the office instead of disposables.
Reusing office supplies is a great idea!

At School.

• Use both sides of paper.
• Save and reuse boxes, mailing tubes, and Styrofoam "peanuts."
• Reuse three-ring binders, Manila folders, pocket folders, report covers and other school and office supplies. Use reusable dishes, cups/mugs and silverware.
• Bring "reusable lunches" to school (bring your lunch in a lunch box or canvas bag, plastic sandwich holder and reusable drink container.

To most folks, any junk mail is too much. Recycling junk mail is okay, but reducing the flow of junk mail will conserve natural resources and save you time and money.

Every time you buy something, order a product by mail or on the Web, enter a contest, make a donation, write a check, subscribe to a magazine, or send in a warranty card, chances are your name and address are being added to a mailing list of some kind. That mailing list might be rented, sold, or traded to other companies.

If your mailbox at home or work is overflowing with unwanted solicitations, advertisements and other literature, you have probably wondered what you can do about it. Due to the changes in law you can now be removed from credit card and junk mailing lists by making a toll-free call.

Return junk mail stamped "address correction requested" or "return postage guaranteed." Return junk mail unopened to the sender by writing "Refused" or "Return to sender" on the envelope. Without this special notation; the post office will not return the mail to the sender.

Grass Cycling--What could be easier? Set your mower to cut a little long, and leave the clippings on the lawn. No bags to empty when you mow, reduce the water needed on your lawn, reduce the need to fertilize and thereby reduce toxic runoff to creeks and lakes via the storm drains.

Grass clippings are 80% water and contain 2- 4% nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium and other nutrients. This is also good for you in lowering fertilizer costs. Leaving grass clippings on the lawn returns nutrients to the soil resulting in healthier turf. Simply allow your grass to grow to three inches and then cut no more than one inch off the top. This is the "one-third" rule. This helps develop a deeper root system which is a natural defense against weeds, disease and drought. This benefits the environment. Improves your lawn. Saves time; and prevents making garbage.

Since 1993, domestically produced alkaline and carbon zinc batteries contain no added mercury and are essentially mercury-free. Since early 1995, rechargeable alkaline batteries contain no added mercury and are essentially mercury-free.

Almost everyone uses and discards batteries into the waste stream. Although waste batteries are a small amount of the solid waste stream, they are a concentrated source of some types of heavy metals. The main constituents of concern for human health and the environment include: cadmium, lead and mercury.

A Green Government would pass a law requiring all batteries to be reusable/rechargeable batteries. Single-use batteries would be outlawed.

Sudbury should also host two "leave no trace" events each year. A “Use-It-Again Sudbury” program features community "garage sale give aways" which allows residents to drop off and pick up items for free. These “no waste like home” events would make an "eco-impact" by drastically reducing city disposal, transportation and energy costs. It's as much about economics as it is about taking a pro-active environmental stance.

This promotion of ecologically inspired efficiency would reduce citizens’ "ecological footprint," and a "zero waste no trace" strategy would lead to an "ecological endpoint goal." The effort in Seattle recycled 60 tonnes of metal last year, and an estimated 221 tonnes of materials were reused and diverted from landfills.

Sudbury’s "eco-cycle exchange" would be an online community bulletin board where individuals can offer up free, unwanted reusable items or browse through listings and find a treasure of their own. It's free to join, free to post, free to browse, and best of all, every item up for exchange is free. Think of it as a virtual garage sale that you can visit 24/7!

Clean out your closet or garage and post your unwanted but still reusable and free goods on the eco-cycle exchange. If you're posting an item, you decide how you want to be contacted-by email, phone, or anonymous form and you arrange the exchange with interested parties. Your posting consists of a short description of the item, and there's an easy way to upload photos too, if you'd like.

Put more effort into publicizing a prescription eyeglass program, which not only reduces garbage but helps others see well by donating old prescription eyeglasses to LensCrafters' Gift of Sight program. www.givethegiftofsight.org.

Put more effort into publicizing our local ReStore.

Juliet Racine - Manager
450 Notre Dame Avenue, Unit 9
Sudbury, ON P3C 5K8
Tel: [phone]
Fax: [phone]
Email: [e-mail]
Website: www.habitatsudbury.com

Don’t forget the Salvation Army and similar charities. They represent one of the best and most generous ways to make sure your household items and clothing get reused.

All of these ideas lessen the amount of material going into our waste stream.

Thus, it's time to move into the second phase of recycling, which is deciding who pays. A new approach to recycling would shift the financial burden of these curbside programs off local governments and squarely onto the private sector. Establishing stringent mandates, would, in effect, force manufacturers to take greater responsibility for the waste they produced. As the debate over these "demand-side" programs widens, policymakers and voters must take a candid look at the costs and benefits of these measures.

Product stewardship is a concept whereby environmental protection centers around the product itself, and everyone involved in the lifespan of the product is called upon to take up responsibility to reduce its environmental impact. For manufacturers, this includes planning for, and if necessary, paying for the recycling or disposal of the product at the end of its useful life. For retailers and consumers, this means taking an active role in ensuring the proper disposal or recycling of an end-of-life product.

Germany's "Green Dot" program has reduced packaging by remarkable amounts. Licensing of the Green Dot trademark is used to finance the system. Any surplus income resulting from the licensing is returned co the program participants through cost reductions or investments in the further development of the system. The Green Dot symbol may be printed on packaging if the manufacturer has paid a license fee. The fee is determined based on the polluter-pays principle and "depends on the material, weight and volume or area of the packaging. As such, it is an incentive to optimize packaging: The less the pack weighs, the lower the license fee will be.

Advance disposal fees (ADFs) impose a “front-end” charge on products or materials before they are discarded as waste. Manufacturers oppose front-end fees placed on products at the point of purchase but those you buy the product and create the waste should pay, otherwise it’s simply the poor subsidizing the rich when "waste-end" mechanisms are imposed at the point of disposal, which are funded through property taxes. Shifting the costs of wasteful recycling onto businesses only means that citizens will have to pay the bill wearing their consumer, rather than their taxpayer, hat.

Despite manufacturer’s opposition to ADFs, advance disposal fees have been in place in Ontario for decades, and they are expanding. Beer bottles and old pop bottles employed ADF formula's and wine bottles were just added in early 2007.

The government could also create a modest "Eco-Green Tax" to help fund the cost of our "Green Acres" sustainable development and ongoing transportation costs. Like the ADF, a green tax would be applied at the point of purchase of any goods to fund the disposal costs. The purpose would be to provide consumers with accurate information about the true costs of their choices in the marketplace. The intent is to immediately correct the distortions created by the "free ecosystems" commons and the belief that nature can endlessly absorb human impacts without costs.

Product pricing must reflect all environmental and social costs created throughout their entire lifecycle from first design to final disposal. Full cost accounting thus requires a legislative foundation and a landfill disposal green tax would increase manufacturer's attention to packaging waste minimization. The UK and Germany has moved in this direction and set the benchmark standard.

The problem with the current approach is that there is simply no incentive for anyone to limit trash production, since they will pay the same annual trash collection fee through property taxes no matter how much or little they produce. A green tax would eliminate garbage collection costs from the property tax structure and no longer would small families or people who produce little garbage underwrite large families that produce more garbage and garbage collection costs. This would also eliminate the chance of the province or municipalities from enacting "pay-as-you-throw" garbage bag fees, which is already happening in some communities.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in the Austria

"Green Manufacturing" should be the focus of our nation. Products and packaging made from recycled material are everywhere; in stores that sell groceries, office supplies, auto parts, and everything in between. Recyclables are transformed into an amazing variety of new products everyday. There's no limit to the things that can be made from recyclables; and the "happy eco-friendlier by-products" manufactured from recycled garbage would create even more jobs.

Anything made of aluminum can be recycled repeatedly without loss of metal quality or properties: not only cans, but aluminum foil, plates and pie molds. Aluminum ore is so expensive to mine that recycling aluminum more than pays for itself. Burning it produces no energy so clearly, aluminum is valuable to recycle and not useful to burn. Recycling aluminum cans saves 95% of the energy required to make the same amount of aluminum from its virgin source, bauxite.

Aluminum companies have invested in dedicated state of the art secondary metal processing plants to recycle aluminum. In the case of beverage cans, the process uses gas collected from burning off the volatile substances in can coatings to provide heat for the process. Every last bit of energy is used.

The aluminum can is 100% recyclable; there are no labels or covers to be removed and used beverage cans are normally back on supermarket shelves as new beverage cans in 8 weeks. Sudbury already has a beverage bottling company on Lorne Street, so we already have a built in customer.

Aluminum cans are worth 6 to 20 times more than any other used packaging material and aluminum is the only packaging material that more than covers the cost of its own collection and processing at recycling centres. The aluminum can is therefore good news for the environment and good for the economy.

However, the greatest use of Aluminum is in the auto industry where almost 6 billion pounds are currently used, and is increasing year upon year. This increasing use gives aluminum’s established credibility as a ""Green Metal" a further boost, and several different product manufacturing plants could be established.

This includes a wide range of items such as beverage cans, car cylinder heads, window frames, electrical cabling, pie pans, house siding, small appliances, lawn furniture, and almost anything else made of aluminum. Alternatively, aluminum can be back hauled to Alcan's plant in Quebec.

A 27 tonne ingot made from approximately 1.5 million used drinks cans.

Steel cans are easy to recycle due to their magnetic properties and the limited number of potential contaminants in the remanufacturing process. The steel can was invented in England in the early 1800's. It often called a tin can because of the thin layer of tin applied to the can's inner and outer surfaces. Tin is used to protect food and beverage flavors and to prevent rusting. Detinners specialize in removing the tin from steel cans for resale in tin using industries. Steel scrap from detinning is either sold to the steel industry or to the copper precipitation industry.

Iron and steel foundries are an emerging market for steel cans. Foundries use scrap as a raw material in making castings and molds for industrial users. Due to changes in steel-making, an increasing amount of steel cans are tin free. These cans use a chromium ash to achieve the same results as tin.

Steel cans account for more than 90% of all food cans. New high quality steels have led to the development of the new two-piece, drawn and ironed steel can, which may lead to steel's reentry into the beverage can market. Steel is the world's most recycled material and 65% of steel is made from recycled steel. Only steel can be repetitively recycled without ever deteriorating in quality.

Recycled steel is made into steel cans, nails, screws, building materials, tools, and yes, even a Steely. The lovable cousin of the original Slinky. It stretches, snaps back, and makes a ”steely sound.” Everyone wants a Stealy, thus several different product manufacturing plants could be established. Alternatively, steel cans could be back hauled to the steel mills in the Soo (190 miles) &/or Hamilton Ontario.

Ontario throws away some 4 million tonnes of food scraps and organic waste a year and all household food scrap would be turned into high-grade compost and sold for profit; so let’s not say “organic waste,” let’s use the phrase “organic resources.”

First, some simple definitions:

Composting – The process whereby organic waste is transformed into compost. Waste is biologically decomposed and stabilized in the presence of oxygen. This process naturally produces heat that serves to accelerate the process, and kill any pathogens and weed seeds.

Compost – A granular, stable, material, high in organic matter and plant nutrients, that improves soil structure, nutrient content, biological activity and plant yield when applied to land.

Composting is far more than a waste treatment technology. It is an essential component in sustainable development and production. Composting as a human activity has been around for millennia. In recent times, human activity has disrupted the carbon cycle by harvesting organic material (crops), and disposing of waste to landfills and sewers. This has resulted in a range of problems including landfill leachate and gas, nutrient enrichment of waters, and loss of soil quality. Controlled composting offers a sustainable means of beneficial reuse of waste that will prevent further environmental degradation, improve productive soils and restore the carbon cycle.

Composting is a biological stabilization technique which eliminates odours and pathogens and produces a product that is safe and pleasant to use. Organic kitchen scraps, such as vegetables and fruits and their peelings, coffee grounds, tea, egg shells, and, yard wastes, such as grass clippings, leaves and plant trimmings, make up almost a third of our garbage.

Composting can keep all this out of our overloaded landfills and produce a finished product called "humus" that returns valuable nutrients to the soil. Achieving consistent, pathogen-free compost, within a reasonable timeframe, on a large scale requires an appropriately engineered system. Industrial scale guaranteed no odour in-vessel composting systems effectively manage all organic waste, harnessing the nutrients and organic matter present.

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[Max]

In-vessel systems are weatherproof and need not be covered, limit vermin attraction, and workers and sensitive components are not exposed to the composting atmosphere. Vessel systems are modular in design. This allows for flexibility in plant capacity and extension by simply adding additional units.

The enclosed U-shaped vessels have a central axial shaft. The tine bearing shaft and is periodically rotated to maintain porosity, achieve mixing and aerate the material. Shaft movement is computer controlled and, along with the feed-rate of waste, determines the retention time of material in the composter. Shaft rotation and aeration are under smart control. The units contain temperature and other sensors, and feedback from these enables the on-board computer to optimize processing.

All units are equipped with Internet connections to enable smooth software upgrades, remote monitoring and control, and facilitate troubleshooting. The rotation of the shaft along with feed rate can be used to regulate processing times allowing the quality of the final product to be manipulated. Net forward rotation affects retention time, total rotation controls aeration and mixing. Rapid pre-composting in as little as 10 days can achieve significant mass and volume reductions but the product requires extended maturation and curing. A more stable product can be achieved with composting times of 18-25 days.

The early bird doesn't always get to keep the worm; and food scraps would also be used in the production of "Global Worming;" a vermicomposting" process that is simply composting with worms. Red wigglers reproduce very quickly. It takes about 3 weeks for an egg to develop and as many as 20 little worms can be hatched from 1 worm egg. In 3 months they will start breeding making more and more hungry worms!

Red Wiggler worms can consume their weight in organic material every two days. A bin that has half a kilogram of worms needs to be supplied with half a kilogram of compost every 2 days! The worm then excretes a soil-nutrient material called "worm castings". The harvested compost is so rich that it would burn plants if used straight as potting soil, so it is mixed half and half with peat moss or soil and than can be added directly to soil in a garden.

"Global Worming Worm Tea" is created through a brewing process which runs distilled water through Red Wiggler worm castings, the nutritious elements and microorganisms of the castings are captured in a concentrated liquid form. By using Global Worming Worm Tea on your plants and gardens, you put healthy microorganisms back into the soil where they thrive and multiply.

While Global Worming Worm Tea is in a concentrated form, it is an all-natural soil amendment, so you cannot over use or burn out your plants. Global Worming Worm Tea can be sprayed directly onto your plants and will act as an insecticide. It can be added to a compost pile to accelerate the composting process. Larger quantities of Global Worming Worm Tea can also be used to enhance the soil quality of your lawn.

African Night Crawlers Worms and European Night Crawlers Worms can also be used to make compost tea; and these wormy wonders at work are worth their weight in gold! All of these worms also make the ultimate fishermen bait and trolling worms, which would increase our profit when sold. Sudbury has 330 lakes within the city limits, and like fish to bait; thousands of local sport fisher(wo)men would buy up our fat juicy global worms!

You can recycle many types of glass. Glass food and beverage containers can be reused and recycled an infinite number of times. In fact, only light bulbs, ceramic glass, dishes, glass mirrors and window glass can't be recycled. Glass is made from soda ash, sand, and limestone. If it's thrown away, it stays there indefinitely because glass never breaks down into its original ingredients.

The best way to deal with glass trash is recycling. Unlike paper, burning glass in Waste to Energy plants is not a good alternative to recycling. Glass does not provide any heat energy for making steam or electricity. Paper burns in a Waste to Energy plant; glass just melts. Landfilling glass recovers none of its value either. So, recycling is usually the best choice.

To be recycled, glass is sorted by color, crushed into small pieces, and melted down into a liquid. Then, it is molded into new glass containers. Recycling glass is a relatively good energy saver. Using recycled glass to make new glass products requires 40 percent less energy than making it from all new materials. It saves energy because crushed glass, called cullet, melts at a lower temperature than the raw materials used to make glass. And unlike paper, glass jars and bottles can be recycled over and over again. The glass doesn’t wear out.

Old glass is easily made into new glass jars and bottles or into other glass products like fiberglass insulation. Sometimes recycled glass is used as road-construction materials like back fill, or mixed with asphalt and made into glass-phalt paving, thus several different product manufacturing plants could be established.

Paper was invented in China around 105 A.D. by T'sai Lung, who was a Chinese court official. Wasps taught him how to make paper. Wasps chew fibres and weeds into a kind of paste or mash, spit it out to form the walls and chambers of their hive, and when it dries it is a kind of paper sculpture. In the 6th century when the Chinese lost to the Arabs at the Battle of Samarkand, captured paper makers were forced to share their craft with their new masters. A thousand years later, the art of paper making reached Europe.

Paper is a bit like oxygen; it's all around us and almost nobody notices. Paper is one of the most important and useful materials man has ever created. Scientists thought that computers would decrease paper consumption but the opposite has happened. Personal computers and printers account for 155 billion sheets of paper used per year worldwide. It takes 19 full grown trees to make one tonne of paper. By recycling 54 kilograms (about 119 pounds) of newspapers, you can save the equivalent of one tree from being cut down.

Canadians are among the world’s largest consumers of paper products. Not just trees, but entire forests, ecosystems, watersheds and the homes of thousands of plant and animal species go into garbage cans when paper is wasted. Pre-consumer waste refers to waste paper that has been converted and perhaps printed but which has been discarded prior to reaching the consumer. This includes printer off-cuts, envelope trimmings and rejected stocks. Post-consumer waste is paper that is recovered after it has been used as a consumer item. It includes waste paper from offices and homes, old newspapers and packaging. Recycling one tonne of paper saves 7,000 gallons of water and 4,100 kwh of electricity, thereby reducing air and water pollution by 50%.

Typically, newspaper can be recycled 5-7 times. Each time it is recycled, its fibers become shortened. Eventually, they become too short to make good paper. At the recycling center, the collected paper is wrapped in tight bales and transported to a paper mill, where it will be recycled into new paper. We have a paper plant in Espanola; a mere 40 miles from Sudbury. Once the paper no longer qualifies to make new paper it can be incinerated to make electricity.

When newspaper enters the recycling process at a de-inking mill, it is washed in a solution of warm water and chemicals that turns it into a kind of mush. Through a combination of spinning and screening the mush, most ink and other unwanted particles are removed. Deinking also removes fillers, clays, and fiber fragments. It is then air treated in a flotation cell causing any remaining particles to float to the surface. After one last washing and screening, the mush is bleached and, if necessary, mixed with pulp from trees. This mixture is then squeezed to remove the water after which it is dried and pressed and is readied for shipment.

The unusable material left over, mainly ink, plastics, filler and short fibers, is called sludge. Deinking at Cross Pointe’s Miami, Ohio mill results in 22 pounds of sludge for every 100 pounds of wastepaper recycled. The sludge would be burned, in limited amounts, to create energy, &/or used as a fertilizer by local farmers, as value is recovered from the waste.

Some types of paper, such as those using colored inks and glossy finishes, are not easily recycled and would be burned for their energy content. Almost all paper can be recycled today, but some types are harder to recycle than others. Papers that are waxed, pasted, gummed or papers that are coated with plastic or aluminum foil are usually not recycled because the process is too expensive.

Even papers that are recycled are not usually recycled together. Different grades of paper are recycled into different types of new products. Old newspapers are usually made into new newsprint, egg cartons, cereal cartons or paperboard. Old corrugated boxes are made into new corrugated boxes or paperboard.

High-grade white office paper can be made into almost any new paper product, stationery, newsprint, or paper for magazines and books, writing tablets, photocopy paper, letterhead paper, notebook paper, paper grocery bags, corrugated boxes, envelopes, magazines, and cartons, newspaper, gift wrap, paper towels and toilet paper, thus several different product manufacturing plants could be established. However, we’re actually better at finding a use for old paper than we are at getting paper to a recycling bin: Our paper mills import 2.2 million tonnes of recovered paper from the United States every year.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Denmark.

One simple and important dimension of environmental pollutants is whether they accumulate over time or tend to dissipate soon after being emitted. The classic case of non-cumulative pollutant is noise; as long as the source operates noise is emitted into the surrounding air, but as soon as the source is shut down, the noise stops. At the other end of the spectrum we have pollutants that cumulate in the environment in nearly the same amounts as they are emitted. Plastics are a cumulative type of pollutant.

The search for a degradable plastic has been going on for decades, but so far plastic is a substance that decays very slowly by human standards; thus, what we dispose of will be in the environment permanently. Because plastics are made from petroleum and natural gas, they are excellent sources of energy for Waste to Energy plants. This is especially true since plastics are not as easy to recycle as steel, aluminum, or paper.

Plastics almost always have to be hand sorted and making a product from recycled plastics may cost more than making it from new materials. Today, however, new "eco-designed" Optical Sorting Technology from Pellenc Selective Technologies sort plastics and other curbside recyclables in a more effective and efficient manner, which is great news for end market manufacturers. The automated process completely deconstructs your trash and separates it out into the biomass fraction, the inorganic fraction, the synthetic fraction that is appropriate for energy and also the household hazardous waste fraction, which shouldn't go into an energy process. There are a variety of other commingled separation systems for screening and separating mixed waste stream materials as well.



When Alexander Parkes developed the first man-made plastic in the 1860s, he had no idea of the role that it would come to play in our everyday lives. Over the years, plastics have led to many advances in cutting-edge technologies. Clothing manufacturers are now using "Polyester Fibers" made out of plastic soda bottles that are sorted, sliced, diced, washed, heated, palletized, and extruded. Malden Mills used about 140 million recycled bottles in one year (about 15 bottles per jacket) for its popular outerwear fleece fabric, the warm and cozy "Polartec." Recycled plastic is going into making hiking boots by "NatureTex." Patagonia makes a recycled plastic bottle fabric called "Synchilla" while green bottles are being spun into "Cloverfill fluff" that's filling the Rising Star futons. And that T-shirt you’re wearing? It could also be made from recycled soft-drink bottles--it takes about 14 600-millilitre bottles to make an extra large.

The effect your clothes have on the environment is much larger than you would think and far more serious then you might believe. According to a report done by Cambridge University researchers, appropriately titled “Well Dressed?,” clothes are a large and growing source of carbon emissions.

Think about it: The energy used to produce raw materials. The trucks used to transport raw materials to manufacturers. The factories full of machines that make your clothes. The employees drive or bus to work. The trucks that bring your clothes to the stores. The car or bus you drive or ride to go shopping to buy the clothes. The washing machine and dryer that clean your clothes. All of them spew carbon emissions. You’re practically emitting carbon just from walking down the street fully clothed. At the same time, we hear more about poor working conditions in clothing factories, so what is an environmentally savvy consumer to do?

The mantra of businesses targeting and converting consumers towards sustainable purchasing patterns has long been "small steps make all the difference." Shopping in an "ecologically-correct" fashion makes $ense, and "buying recycled “closed loop” “eco-fashion” manufactured products are ways to support the market for re-refined lines of clothing. The more individuals and businesses buy "environmentally preferable" products the more this new market would expand. “Eco-label eco-clothing” and “eco-jewelry” make great “eco-gifts” when “eco-taining” your like minded “eco-friends!”

There is also a wide range of other products made from recycled plastic; because plastic truly is fantastic! This includes but not limited to, bioreactor covers, polyethylene bin liners and carrier bags; PVC sewer pipes, flooring and window frames; building insulation board; video and compact disc cassette cases, plastic lumber, picnic tables, fencing, garden furniture, playground equipment, water butts, garden sheds, composters, seed trays, fibre filling for sleeping bags and duvets, and a variety of office accessories; thus several different product manufacturing plants could be established. However, to be economically viable, plastic processors require large quantities of recycled plastics, manufactured to tightly controlled specification at a competitive price in comparison to that of virgin polymer.

Auto manufacturers have also gotten on the bandwagon. Ford Canada uses recycled pop bottles to make door padding and trunk trim; battery housings for accelerator pedals; and industrial carpeting for its engine-fan modules. Canadian-made Ford trucks, Freestar and Crown Victoria’s contain more than 80% recyclable parts while the industry average is 75%. General Motors has also increased the amount of recycled materials it uses in new cars. Canada auto manufacturers are less than 4 hours away and, with a build in customer and built in reverse supply chain dynamic, next to no plastics would need to be incinerated.

Aseptic or Tetra-Pac Drink boxes are made up of three material types: paper, an aluminum lining, and a plastic coating. Each container goes through a hydro-pulping process that separates the different material types. The resulting paper pulp is then used to make cardboard boxes of all shapes, sizes and colors, as well as toilet paper. Gable top cartons are made only of paper and plastic. Each container goes through a hydro-pulping process that separates the different material types. The resulting paper pulp is then used for all kinds of industrial paper products.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Germany.

Canada also discards 30 million tires each year and all tires should also be sent to Sudbury for recycling, which would create even more jobs. Our “Tire City” “eco-centre” would produce the new “Black Gold;”“Tire Derived Fuel” (TDF). "Reverse Polymusization" is used to reduce tires to oil, carbon black and steel. EWNC system is designed to accommodate 3000 tires or 27 tonnes per day. From one 20-pound tire, 7.5 pounds of carbon black and 2 pounds of steel are recovered yielding a minimum 47.5 percent recycling rate. The remainder of the tire can be used in the production of electricity.

On a weight basis, the energy content of scrap rubber is 15 to 20% greater than that of coal; capturing the energy from tires releases fewer contaminants per unit energy than burning coal at thermoelectric generating stations. From every 3000 tires or 27 tonnes, 3 tonnes of steel, 7.5 tonnes of oil, and 11.5 tonnes of carbon black is produced.

Steel is sold for recycling. Used oil, or "sump oil" as it is sometimes called, can be cleaned of contaminants so it can be recycled again and again. Carbon black is used for new rubber production or other feedstock. Tire production uses 65 to 70% of the world's carbon black production, which represents more than 6,800,000 tonnes annually. Carbon black prices range from 0.02 to 0.60 cents U.S. and this would generate a revenue stream from carbon black sales of 3 to 9 million $ U.S. every year.

We can get a barrel of oil plus gas from one of these tires without using fire or creating harmful emissions.

Only a few years ago, re-refined oil production was limited by numerous technical, economic and marketing constraints. With increased market demands for environmentally preferable products and improved re-refining technology, the availability of re-refined oil is expected to grow. Today's re-refined motor oil is no different from virgin motor oils. Re-refined oils are subject to the same stringent standards that apply to virgin oil-based products. Auto manufacturers have studied re-refined oil lubricants comparing them to virgin oils for performance criteria critical to engine life, and found re-refined motor oils and virgin motor oils equal in performance.

Lubrication is a fact of life; and to ensure our government remains a well oiled machine guidelines for purchasing lubricating oils should require "all" federal, provincial and local agencies and contractors that use government funds to purchase such products to the maximum extent practicable; unless the product is not available. This mandate would reach to fleets of buses, police cars, boats, motorcycles, ambulances, Canada Post vehicles, tractors, dump trucks and garbage trucks.

A "Greening the Government" policy would provide a built in customer base, and the policy would state, and direct, that “no federal, provincial or local agencies shall purchase, sell or arrange for the purchase of virgin petroleum motor vehicle lubricating oils when re-refined oils are reasonably available and meet the vehicle manufacturer’s recommended performance standards.” California is one of the leaders in purchasing re-refined oil closing the recycling loop.

Recycled tires also spend their retirement supporting national sports—literally. More than 50 of our country’s playing fields—including Toronto’s Rogers Centre, Edmonton’s Clarke Stadium and Vancouver’s B.C. Place Stadium—feature FieldTurf, an artificial surface that’s created from spent tires—40,000 per field. This innovation out of Montreal is low-maintenance and easier on players’ bodies than other surfaces, whether natural or artificial. FieldTurf also contains rubber from running shoes. Tires could also be melted down and mixed with the incinerators bottom ash to make vulcanized rubber, which is used to patch cracks in asphalt roadways around the world.

Shredded rubber can also be used to make doormats and shoe soles made out of tire retread shredding, like the ones being sold at Zona in New York City, boot mats, rubber traffic cones and delineator bases, rubber parking stops and impact parking curbs, rubber speed bumps and humps, rubber roofs, rubber sidewalks, rubber playground areas, and as a base in outdoor hockey rinks, sports flooring, and on walking/hiking trails, thus several different product manufacturing plants could be established.

Old running shoes helped surface a new sports complex in the Toronto neighbourhood of Malvern, featuring a running track, basketball court and soccer pitch. A Rubber Research & Development Centre could also be created on the premises.

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So as you can see, there are numerous by-products that can be made in one location in this truly efficient recycling waste to energy "Green Acres" Philosophy. Nothing would be wasted.

After the sorting operation the garbage enters a hopper pit where a crane operator picks up about 1 tonne per scoop and dumps it into the combustor.

This is as dirty as it gets. With automatic sorting technology not one person touches the garbarge from the time it's picked up at the curb!

As mentioned previously, Waste to Energy incineration has a number of outputs such as the ash and the emission to the atmosphere of combustion product gases. The high-temperature incinerator in a Waste to Energy plant burns most of the waste. All that is left is a substance called ash. Ash is the solid residue left over when something is burned. It’s like the ash left over from a wood fire in the bottom of a fireplace.

Bottom Ash means the ash residue remaining after combustion of solid waste or solid waste in combination with fossil fuel in a solid waste incinerator that is discharged through and from the grates, combustor or stoker. Fly ash means the ash residue from the combustion of solid waste or solid waste in combination with fossil fuel that is entrained in the gas stream of the solid waste incinerator and removed by the air pollution control equipment. Combined ash means the mixture of bottom ash and fly ash.

Waste to Energy plants produce two types of ash; incinerator fly ash (IFB) and incinerator bottom ash (IBA). The total amount of ash produced ranges from 10 to 25 percent by weight of the original quantity of waste, and the fly ash amounts to about 10 to 20 percent of the total ash. In a Waste to Energy plant, 2,000 pounds (one tonne) of garbage is reduced to 300–500 pounds of ash. Once burned, the ash turns to a hard concrete, and the heavy metals, like lead and cadmium, are bound within the ash.

The average person produces around 2,000 pounds of waste a year. If all this waste were landfilled, it would take more than two cubic yards of landfill space. That’s the volume of a box three feet long, three feet wide, and six feet high. If that waste were burned, the ash residue would fit into a box three feet long, three feet wide, but only nine inches high!

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Portugal.

In the U.S., the EPA decides whether the ash is hazardous by conducting an extraction procedure toxicity test--known to its friends as EP tox. In the EP tox test dilute acetic acid is poured over ash samples, then they are shaken, and filtered. The leachate is tested for various pollutants. If the lead concentration is more than 2 milligrams per liter, the ash is officially hazardous.

Heavy metals such are lead are indestructible. Whatever heavy metals are put into an incinerator they come out either in the stack gases or in the ash. The more you clean them out of the gases, the more they show up in the ash. Primary sources of lead are batteries, solder, metal alloys, dyed plastics, and colored inks. Lead has been taken out of black newspaper inks, but it is still present in some colored inks.

The only way to keep an incinerator from putting out lead is to stop putting lead into it, either by banning the use of lead where substitutes are available--as in inks--or by recycling objects containing it--such as batteries. We would not be burning batteries and would deink all paper prior to incinerating it. We would burn very little, if any, plastic given the amount of finished products we could make with it and sell for profit.

If the ash is found to be hazardous, it can only be disposed of in landfills which are carefully designed to prevent pollutants in the ash from leaching into underground aquifers, but in testing over the past decade, no ash from a U.S. or European modern Waste to Energy plant has ever been determined to be a hazardous waste.

Ash that is safe can be reused for many applications, such as making cement blocks and even to make artificial reefs for marine animals. About one-third of all the ash produced is used in landfills as a daily or final cover layer, thus we could back haul it to cities for landfill cover material and for gas venting layer material. As stated previously, there are over 10,000 landfills in Canada.

Rubber and bottom ash can also be mixed with asphalt for road construction, made into rubber sand bags for flooding purposes, and "Enviro-Bricks." "With the solid look of a brick home, and the environmentally responsible aspect of mass recycling, Enviro-Bricks provide the answer to a very critical worldwide need." R40 insulation! The city could partner up with Rainbow or Browne's Concrete to make "Eco-Smart" Cement Blocks and "Enviro-Earth Bricks" or develop them on our own.

Researchers have found that bricks made from fly ash, fine ash particles captured as waste by coal power plants, may be even safer than predicted. Instead of leaching minute amounts of mercury as some researchers had predicted, the bricks apparently do the reverse, pulling minute amounts of the toxic metal out of ambient air.

Manufacturing clay brick requires kilns fired to high temperatures, which wastes energy, pollutes air and generates greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. In contrast, fly ash bricks are "self-cementing," flame resistant and manufactured at room temperature and cured in the open air. They conserve energy, cost less to manufacture, and don't contribute to air pollution or global warming.

Once colored and shaped, the bricks are similar to their clay counterparts, both in appearance and in meeting or exceeding construction-material standards. Coal fly ash and Waste to Energy fly ash are the same thing, thus different ash manufactured product could be established.

Fly and bottom ash is also used as a component in the production of "Flowable Fill" (also called controlled low strength material, or CLSM), which is used as self-leveling, self-compacting backfill material in many applications, including a sub base for parking lots and new asphalt road constuction, in lieu of compacted earth or granular fill. Therefore, the ash could be used to backfill the roadbed construction of the four lanes on highway 69 from Sudbury to just north of Parry Sound! Thus Sudbury would not be landfilling any ash for years to come given the volume of backfill the highway 69 project requires.

The most common method of ash management is disposal in landfill, either commingled with MSW or alone in an ash "monofill." A monofill is a landfill that contains only ash, no raw garbage. However, today, ash has become a beneficial by-product and using ash for the products just mentioned is a significant step “towards zero landfills." Excessive ash can also be stored in exhausted mines, if need be.

Some might say; I'm a total "ash-hole" for thinking up this whole garbage idea, but in truth, it's time to follow the "Green Brick Road" as this treasure trove of trash will turn "Garbage into Gold", is a "Building Block" to our future, and our "Pot of Gold" at the end of the rainbow! Others will be "Green with Envy" and this entire plan would create a truly "Solid" Waste Management system.

Modern incinerators are very different from the incinerators that were commonly used until a few decades ago. Old-type incinerators usually did not include a materials separation to remove hazardous or recyclable materials before burning, and tended to risk the health of the plant workers and the nearby residents, and most of them did not generate electricity.

Modern incinerators emit less air pollution than coal plants, but more than natural gas plants. The USEPA has characterized modern incinerators as "producing electricity with less environmental impact than almost any other source of electricity."

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in the Netherlands

Waste to Energy plants have a kind of built-in anti-pollution device, as its furnace burns at such high temperatures--1,800 to 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit--many complex chemicals naturally break down into simpler, less harmful compounds. Waste to Energy plants employ a combination of air pollution control devices, including scrubbers, fabric filters, and electrostatic precipitators to control acid gases, particles, nitrogen oxides, metals and organic emissions.

The EPA wants to make sure that harmful gases and particles are not going out the smokestack into the air. Scrubbers clean chemical gas emissions by spraying a liquid into the gas stream to neutralize the acids. Fabric filters and electrostatic precipitators remove particles from the emissions. The particles are then mixed with the ash that is removed from the bottom of the Waste to Energy plant's furnace when it is cleaned.

As stated previously, the most publicized concerns from environmentalists about the incineration of municipal solid wastes (MSW) involve the fear that it produces significant amounts of dioxin and furan emissions to the atmosphere. Dioxins and furans are considered by many to be serious health hazards. Older generation incinerators that were not equipped with modern gas cleaning technologies were indeed significant sources of dioxin emissions. Today, however, due to advances in emission control designs and stringent new governmental regulations, modern Waste to Energy incinerators emits virtually no dioxins. The quantity of pollutants in the emissions from large-scale incinerators is reduced by scrubbing process, as well as other processes.

According to the USEPA, modern incinerators are no longer significant sources of dioxins and furans. In 1987, before the governmental regulations required the use of emission controls, there was a total of 10,000 grams of dioxin emissions from U.S. Waste to Energy incinerators. Today, the total emissions from the 98 plants are only 10 grams, a reduction of 99.9%. Backyard barrel burning of household and garden wastes, still allowed in some rural areas, generates 580 grams of dioxins yearly. Studies conducted by the USEPA demonstrate that the emissions from just one family using a burn barrel produces more emissions than a modern incinerator disposing of 200 tons of waste per day.

According to the 2005 report from the Ministry of the Environment of Germany, where there are 66 incinerators, in 1990 one third of all dioxin emissions in Germany came from waste incineration plants, for the year 2000 the figure was less than 1%. Chimneys and tiled stoves in private households alone discharge approximately twenty times more dioxin into the environment than waste incineration plants.

Odour pollution can also be a problem with old-style incinerators, but odours and dust are extremely well controlled in a modern incinerator. They receive and store the waste in an enclosed area with a negative pressure with the airflow being routed through a boiler which prevents unpleasant odours from escaping into the atmosphere.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in the U.K.

Sudbury could also incorporate clinical incinerators. The aim of incinerating this category of waste is to remove the pollution and health risks, rather than to reduce volume. Incineration of medical waste produces an end product ash that is sterile and non-hazardous.

We could also include a plant for human waste, solving our stinky problem in Lively. Toronto produces 160,000 tonnes a year in sewage. There is over 400,000 tonnes in Ontario. Toronto sends some 15 trucks a day to Quebec and elsewhere to dispose of it. That's another 15 full time truck driver jobs; not to mention more tipping fees.

Sewage is a source of biomass energy that is very similar to the other animal wastes, the only difference being that it has been treated in developed countries for many years. Energy can be extracted from sewage using anaerobic digestion to produce "biogas." The sewage sludge that remains can then be incinerated or undergo pyrolysis to produce more biogas and 'bio-oil'. The Plamsa Arc technology discussed earlier would do the job.

Sudbury spends over 8 million $ a year on fuel for our city buses, city vehicles, snowplows, fire trucks, ambulances, and cop cars. By becoming a “bioneer” in bio-fuel the Biogas can be turned into diesel fuel which would save us over 8 million $. We would be getting paid to accept the fuel our vehicles burn. Our infeed fuel for free! There’s some fuel for thought!

Paint sludge that used to be thrown away, for example, is now dried to a powder and shipped to a plastics manufacturer, ending up eventually as parking lot bumpers and guardrails, although, hopefully, we wouldn't be getting much paint in regular trash. However, the city collects used paint all the time, thus an "eco-elements" "eco-paint" factory could be established. To be recycled, the used paints are blended, filtered to industry standards and mixed with a percentage of conventional paint. The high-quality product covers most surfaces in one coat and is the half the price of comparable conventional paint. What was once a one-colour, limited-use product is now available in numerous grades, colours and percentages of post-consumer content.

"E-Waste" is a huge business today, and Xstrata's state-of-the-art Electronic Recycling Business operation, the only one of its kind in Canada, is located in an 82,200 square-foot industrial facility in Brampton, Ontario. Xstrata operates in Sudbury and there is no reason why we couldn't open a centre here; not only for Sudbury, but all of northern Ontario.

Electronic devices such as computer monitors and TVs contain hazardous materials that must be managed properly. Picture tubes, or cathode ray tubes (CRTs), are made with three to eight pounds of the heavy metal lead. Circuit boards also contain lead in addition to cadmium, mercury and other hazardous materials. Heavy metals such as lead can cause damage to living organisms at very low concentrations and tend to accumulate in the food chain.

Illegal dumping and the improper disposal of waste impacts public health and safety, property values and the quality of life in our community.

A Take it Back Network is a partnership among government agencies, retailers, repair shops, charitable organizations and recyclers that provides consumers with options for recycling certain wastes–and their hazardous components–in a safe and cost effective manner. Some electronics manufacturers also offered their corporate customers a recycling service for their used equipment.

Our Take it Back Network would accept a variety of electronic equipment such as computers, monitors, printers, TVs, cell phones, PDAs, fax machines, stereos, DVD and VCR players, other household electronics and rechargeable batteries. The electronics are recycled domestically in an environmentally sound manner.

Fluorescent light bulbs and tubes are no longer accepted as regular garbage and our new Electronic Recycling Business would accept fluorescent bulbs and tubes and recycle them domestically in an environmentally sound manner.

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By becoming the province &/or country's kidney all of these net economic and social benefits will never disappear, because based on current trends, our throwaway society would continue to supply a lifetime of incinerator feedstock.

As part of our contract with the provincial and federal governments to require local governments to deliver us guaranteed tonnage of waste flow to incinerate, we would also require a garbage bag manufacturer be created in Sudbury, creating even more jobs. All cities providing garbage would use our transparent garbage bags. Blue bags for dry waste and Green bags for wet waste. All bags will contain barcode technology so we have the capability of tracing where the garbage came from, and all unauthorized garbage items will be returned to the city of origin.

Creating manufacturer plants in Sudbury that makes clothing, futons, shoe soles, nails, tin cans, oil based lubricants, hydraulic, gear or transformer oil, aluminum, rubber and steel products out of recycled materials is not difficult to do. It's just a matter of money. A manufacturing plant would have a positive ongoing impact on our city, from new jobs to adding new ratepayers to our tax roll. It is transportation costs that make a manufacturer not interested in setting up shop in Sudbury.

However, having a build in low-cost reverse supply chain dynamic, and low cost electricity for production, would make Sudbury a very attractive location for any manufacturer, thus the additional benefits of this project is underscored. Even if we only produce the raw material from the waste for a manufacturer elsewhere this project is still a moneymaker. Producing and providing low cost electricity would also attract other manufacturers to Sudbury that are unrelated to this waste industry, which would create even more employment.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Spain

This massive "Green Acres" indoor properly ventilated eco-industrial "Waste to Wealth" Science Park would not become an eyesore nor would we have smelly garbage and seagulls everywhere, as we would employ a "Just-in-Time" delivery system of garbage fuel. A just-in-time inventory system is designed to ensure that materials arrive at a facility just when they are needed so that the storage is minimized. Thus, this eco-park would not be plagued by the syndrome known as NIMBY (not-in-my-back-yard) or LULU (locally unacceptable land use).

Sudbury has lived in the smokestack economy for over 100 years, so returning the Twin Stacks to action would not be a major hurdler to overcome. If Inco announced they were shipping 10 million tonnes of ore to Sudbury to smelt every year everyone would be cheering. This project is much better, because part of profits and perks end up in citizens pockets; not in a private business owners pocket; especially a business that is owned by a company in Brazil.

Inco’s smelting techniques used to be very inefficient; today it’s not. Thanks to technology, Inco dramatically cleaned the waste gases before pumping them up the Superstack; removing around 90% of the sulphur dioxide. Incinerators have cleaned up their act and come of age as well. Now our turn and it's time for Citizens in Sudbury to come of age, too. Incinerators are sustainability in its truest and finest form. "Green Acres" would not only solve the garbage and landfill problems, but also significantly alleviate the current energy crisis.

It should also be pointed out just how close Inco’s tailing pond is from a residential area. Though its contents are held back by a retaining wall, this stuff is pretty much right there in some people's backyards, and no one complains, and no one is calling for a ban.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in West Indies.

The cause and nature of some obstacles to industrial development are imposed by elected vote-seeking officials, faceless bureaucrats, pressure groups, Greens, and grass root groups who pass themselves off as community spirited activists.

The same grass roots reformers who might oppose this project would be the very same people protesting if Inco announced it was closing down its operations and smokestack . Employed people usually oppose this hotly debated topic yet these employed anti growth protesters are also the very ones who complain about property tax increases to pay for increased welfare costs due to high unemployment.

This project provides a lifetime supply of material to market and helps create the resource base necessary to secure exciting new workscapes and significant improvement in economic security and quality of life.

Therefore, we must work together and tap valuable niche market areas and give Sudbury a much-needed economic face-lift by exploiting the practical side of idealism to fuel growth, protect the environment, and safe crack our future.

Moreover, in a country where opinion polls regularly show that 80% of the population consider themselves to be committed to environmental protection, we should be able to design the project to remedy any social concerns by having members of the community and environmentalists involved from the very inception of the venture.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Germany.

The goal is to create a "humanistic eco-industrial technology science park," a "digital dump," whose purpose is not just to produce electricity, but also to create a "cleaner economy" with a "positive environment" for the people that work there, the community, and the people who would tour the facilities. Conceptually and physically, the centre would express a redefinition of mans relationship with the environment. The plant must be state of the art in terms of environmental sustainability, thus high-performance Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED®), Canada's "Green Building Standards," would be used, including, but not limited to, a vegetated roofing system that reduces storm water runoff, provides additional insulation, and reduces "heat island" effects.

Understanding the various paths through the plant, from how the garbage gets sent from one area to the next, to how people work or tour the facility is of great importance in shaping the plant. Sky lighting can be incorporated that would include "daylight-harvesting" sensors that automatically adjust lighting depending on the amount of natural light available. This would not only reduce the amount of lighting required, but can also make interiors wonderful spaces to work in.

Another issue that affects community relationships is the increased road traffic of waste collection vehicles transporting waste to the incinerator. Some of this public opposition is now being defused by offering "host fees" or other compensation to the resident’s whose host a WtE plant in their neighborhood.

In our case, transport trucks would not enter the city core, or Coniston, as a new transport / employee only road will be constructed from Highway 17 to the plant, with a strict photo radar enforced 30 mph speed limit. Trucks and trains would dump indoors where the garbage is sorted then incinerated.

While on the highways, Citizens would not know the difference between transports delivering garbage from a transport delivering food. And, with up to 2000+ employees, the spin off jobs in Coniston at restaurants and stores would be extensive.

Another factor worth noting is that heat generated in the plant can be harvested and sold to homeowners in Coniston at extremely low cost for being the "host neighbourhood," while some of the steam can be sold to district heating systems for our adjacent onsite industrial manufacturing customers.

There is no right or wrong place for an incinerator but with prevailing winds from the West, and the bulk of the city to the East, the Twins Stack site is a great location. However, this project does not even need to be located in Coniston, and maybe the old stacks cannot be salvaged; but if we can recycle the Twin Stacks than we should do so. Nevertheless, with the highways, bypass and rail line right next to the smelter property it is ideal place for such a venture; with or without using the stacks. If they are usable, however, it would reduce start up costs. Today, part of the Twin Stacks is surrounded by a "Green Golf Course," which is perfect for the humanistic environment we're trying to create at this eco-industrial science park, and 9 new holes could be added to the course.

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Taking this mega-recycling school of thought one step further requires underscoring another important factor of this fundamentally sound project. There are some 73,000 residential units in Sudbury, and not only would we create thousands of jobs, but we would also produce enough 100 percent renewable electricity to supply every residential unit with a set amount of electricity and electric heat for FREE!

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Norway.

Customers who use more electricity than the allowable limit would be charged market prices for all excess usage. This smart energy "Green Growth" project would
eliminate inflated and unstable natural gas and electricity prices, GST, and bill bank paying costs for our Citizens. Currently monthly charges for gas are 16 $ plus GST regardless of the amount of gas used. Add the transportation charge, plus GST, storage charge, plus GST, and your bill is 30 to 40 $ a month, every month, before you even use any gas.

For the average consumer, eliminating a series of nuisance costs like natural gas fees, GST thereon, and bank bill paying charges, is the equivalent of reducing a 2000 $ property tax bill by up to or over 100 percent! In other words, whether you're a property owner or renter, rich or poor, each user could receive a 2000 $ or so economic incentive per year if we proceed with this project. Thus, it would not only solve Sudbury's Hydro-Hell problem with unsustainable, unaffordable and unjust access to energy; but also put waste in its place!

Consider the alternative. Our federal government has already announced that natural gas rates are going to rise in order to cut down of greenhouse gas emissions produced during gas production. Cutting greenhouse gases will cool the earth’s temperature; which will drive your natural gas consumption and energy costs even higher, since the earth will be colder.

We could, and should also be using "Green Billing Accounts" (paperless) to eliminate non-value added activities and expenses. "Electronic billing" is easy, it's quick, it's secure, and there is no bill paying service charge.

Our "E-Pay" system would require you to enroll, following which you would receive an e-mail notification confirming the approval of your enrollment. The User ID chosen by you is to be used to Login into the system. After which you would be receiving an e-mail notification on monthly basis informing you that your bill is ready for viewing and payment is due in 14 days. On the due date you bill would be paid by automatic debit from your bank account or charged to your credit card, depending on which bill paying system you have selected. This e-service thereby eliminates paper, printers, ink, envelopes and postage, which would reduce city expenditures that you pay by a million or more $ every year.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in the USA.

Constant adjustments along the "future forward way" must be made in order to solve our economic problems, but to adjust and adapt is the "badge of intelligence." With the advent of genetic engineering, and through better cloning techniques that are currently being used, trees can also be genetically manipulated to grow faster and burn hotter. The hotter an incinerator burns the less emissions that are emitted.

Under this smart growth scenario trees are fully-grown in 3 years and ready for harvest and incineration. Growing energy forestry crops on a large scale can also be used to fuel an "Ethanol plant" and Ethanol plants are the way to the fuel future! An Ethanol plant would create many more new jobs when farming is included.

In partnership with Inco, Sudbury could, and should begin producing electricity from the Superstack, thus further increasing electricity production and reducing the strain on the provinces power grid.

For those who don't know, Inco's Superstack is 1247 feet tall; only 121 feet shorter than the former World Trade Center in "Zoo" York City. The Superstack was the tallest structure in Canada until the CN tower opened in Toronto in 1976. The Superstack was the tallest smoke stack in the world but is now the second tallest freestanding chimney after the GRES-2 Power Station in Kazakhstan, which is about 38 meters taller. However, Sudbury's Superstack is still the tallest cigar in the Western hemisphere and remains the second tallest freestanding structure in Canada. It was constructed by Inco in 1972 at an estimated cost of 25 million $.

The Superstack sits atop the largest nickel smelting operation in the world at Inco's Copper Cliff processing facility and could produce enough electricity for 200,000 homes; and could've been doing so for the past 35 years.

Hot air rises, naturally, and the Superstack operates as a giant vacuum. As the hot air rises in the stack it would past through an array of turbine generators clustered inside the stack. The result: enough clean, green electricity to power some 200,000 homes without producing a particle of pollution or a wisp of planet-warming gases.

Inco's copper refinery is now releasing stream and not even using the Superstack, and this stream could, and should also be used to produce electricity. The heat from the Superstack could, and should also be harvested to heat Dynamic Earth, homes and businesses in Copper Cliff; and it could've been doing so for the past 35 years.

Xstrata also has a smokestack in its smelter which could be utilized for the same electricity producing process.

We could also turn every available exhausted mine shaft into a 350,000 kilowatts a day energy producing shaft by repeatedly using the same water over and over again. Water from a reservoir above ground would drop down the shaft through a power plant underground and then be pumped backed to the upper pool to be repeated again and again.

To add to our renewable mix, "Electro Kinetic Road Ramps" should also be installed in our high traffic roadways to create electricity and give us a cutting clean-tech edge. When cars drive over ramps they produce electricity that will be used to power streetlights, traffic lights and cross walk signals, which would reduce our electricity costs. Several other street lights, traffic signals and would be solar-powered.

All of these ideas would make Sudbury a global hotbed of "alternative-energy entrepreneurship," thus, our "risk appetite" needs to expand and it's time to take some calculated risks and to view innovation as the "Bank of Tomorrow." Make deposits into it today and it will yield dividends tomorrow. By creating new jobs, and new virgin revenue sources, we would reduce everyone's property taxes when the newly generated revenue is applied to city expenditures, thus, the idea of being able to provide Citizens with a living wage and lower taxes while at the same time heal the planet is an enormously attractive one.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Burnaby B.C. Canada.

Creating new jobs would dry up available unskilled and semiskilled workers thereby driving up the wages of other low-income workers city wide who would then hop skip and jog to the highest paying job offer. This very un-tech job creating solution would also lower out of wedlock births, the use and sale of illegal drugs, crime rates, policing, prosecuting and prison costs, while increasing spending in the city, gas tax, GST and income tax revenue for both federal and provincial governments, thus reducing the dependency on taxpayer support. Creating new revenue for senior levels of government puts Sudbury in a position to receive more in-grant aid.

Therefore, the federal government has a vested interest in seeing this venture become reality by providing funding for the project. The federal government has billions of $ set aside for their war on climate change and this project is their lead eco-fighting warrior, thus we need to tap into their cash register!

For the sake of this discussion consider this; suppose building 20 burners, 5 manufacturing plants covering dozens of lines of products and, adding turbines to Inco's Superstack and Xstrata stack cost 10 billion $. From just one penny of GST the federal government makes over 5 billion $ every 3 months. They could pay this off in 6 months! By February 2009, they will have spent 7 billion $ of OUR money in Afghanistan. Think about that!

The federal government has multi billion $ surpluses every year! In 2006, all levels of government, municipal, provincial and federal, had a 29 billion $ surplus. Spending 10 billion $ "one time" to eliminate up to 100 million tonnes of greenhouse gas EVERY YEAR is a bargain! The federal government can print off all the money it needs! The provincial and municipal governments cannot. The provincial government would also chip in reducing the federal government’s burden in this project.

Once the federal government invests they would pay out less in employment insurance, GST rebates, processing and postage costs while its taxation collections in insurance premiums, GST and income tax would rise. The federal government would also increase their revenue from private firms that the new employees patronize when the employees earnings are spent. Instead of being a burden on the federal treasury a great many new people would contribute to it.

Studies estimate that for every million $ the government spends on public projects it gets back in tax revenue and employment insurance savings about 500,000 $. The net cost to government is therefore only about half of the actual investment. Thus, they could fund the 10 billion $ project and it only cost them 5 billion.

The net cost could turn out to be smaller still. If the improvement in employment and sales prompts business to expand--and this project would--then the government would collect additional tax revenue and save even more in employment insurance payouts as a result of the jobs created by the private sector expansion. Thus, eventually the government recoups "all" of its funding despite the large-scale upfront investment.

As the portfolio of possibilities is endless, Sudbury must think outside the square, heat up the city's economic thermostat, and innovate to grow this wisdom economy.

The "eco-product-index" is extensive, the local-sourcing vast; and this venture is at a minimum a ten-way-trade-off. (1) Sudbury gets much needed jobs, (2) Sudbury businesses and residents get low cost hydro, (3) Sudbury increases revenue from the sale of excess hydro, (4) Highway 69 is completed soon rather than later, (5) the province gets to eliminate landfills across the province, (6) the province gets a much needed new source of hydro for its insatiable volume demand, (7) the province reduces the burden on the already taxed hydro generation system by removing Sudbury's hydro needs from their power grid, (8) the province and city reduces welfare rolls, (9) the province increases income tax revenue from new jobs created, and (10) the province increases sales tax revenue from the newly employed people spending their earnings.

Sudbury’s renewable energy field would import over two billion $ a year in low carbon currency tipping fees--over 20 billion every 10 years--while sales from newly manufactured products would fetch over 336 million $ more. This economic growth and output would create 2000+ cleaner economy jobs in this new wisdom economy. Two thousand 45,000 $ a year jobs would have a 90 million $ annual impact in Sudbury from employee wages alone!

Even without other province’s trash, Ontario produces enough garbage to guarantee waste flow electricity production and would produce hundreds of millions in tipping fees.

So as you can see, there are many "positive feedback loops" and nothing here is intellectually complex or hard to do, and this wise intoxicating prosperity plan is simple to understand, easy to implement, and as win win as it gets!

Compare this "smart growth revenue friendly bulletproof prosperity plan" to what our current mayor is offering!

Higher taxes, less service and no jobs! Dumb growth in the extreme!

Our mayor can play Mary Had a Little Lamb but he can't play Beethoven! Our mayor is a walking talking excuse and lacks the ability to choreograph a win without telling a lie. Our mayor lied his way into office because he knew he wouldn't win otherwise.

Our Twentieth Century mayor provides no future based answers for he’s not innovative or revolutionary ready because he's fluent in NDP.

Continued after jump...

[Max]

A great idea however is still only an idea until you put it into action, and despite this scenario planning, no scheme is without flaws. Without senior level of government commitments this plan won't work, but what isn't tried won't work either, as you can't harvest what you haven't planted. Conversely, you can reap what you sow and if this seed idea took root and grew our environment would be the main benefactor.

Waste to Energy and Plasma Arc have only recently gained buzzword status in Canada, but with senior government providing the necessary ”Green Ammunition” we would win the War on Waste. Pursuing the concept of this large-scale energy project with senior levels of government costs us nothing, so if the venture is not approved, we are safe to fail. However, with senior government support, expertise, and financial "Green Aid" backing, this Trash to Cash Garbage to Gas project will not fail.

Therefore, the time is ripe to wise up, recycle our brains, demonstrate some smarts, come to grips with our "carbon footprint" and end "eco-pro-poor policies and employ innovative ""eco-pro-growth" marketplace dynamics. However, all of these "eco-realism" job and revenue creating ideas are completely AWOL in our current federal, provincial and city council’s agenda's, as they continue to sail along in a sea of underachieving uninspiring sameness.

So as “Greenmania” sweeps the globe there's no better time to take "eco-action" by "recycling the leader" of this province and electing a Greenmania money minded leader so we can start producing "eco-energy" in our "eco-coolio city." Burning trash for electricity and cash has science is on it side. But so far, politics is not. The world outside of Canada has openly accepted and embraced WtE incinerators; because garbage and sewage are energy sources that really cleans up! Here, we have not, and that’s due in large part to the thick, political scar tissue we’ve developed over the years as we remain locked in a time warp of collective failure of imagination; and we need to stop letting opportunities "go to waste."

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in Switzerland.

Premier Dalton McGuinty claims he wants Ontario to become a leader in incinerator and biomass technology but has done nothing to achieve the vision. He went to investigate how Sweden solved their garbage problem and revitalize their waterfront. Sweden is a socialist country, with womb-to-tomb governmental care. They are more NDP than the NDP, but even they understand that landfilling--even with diversion--is the worst way to handle garbage. As stated previously, Subbor is Canadian Technolgy built right here in Ontario, yet despite "McGuilty's" claims, he allowed Toronto to buy the Green Lane "mega-landfill" cesspool near London.

State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy Plant in the Sweden.

Sweden’s incinerators emit exhaust that is 98% water. Last time I checked the leachate from landfills is not 98% water nor is water harmful to us. But incinerators do have one powerful pollutant. Sweden's “30” incinerator’s produce less than one measly "gram” of dioxin per year, so I guess you can see why "McGuilty" approved Toronto’s purchase of Green Lane megafill.

All of the State-of-the-Art Waste to Energy plants depicted on this portal are city dumps. A landfill is just a fancy word for dump. Do you see any garbage, seagulls, bears at their dump? Nope, you see architecturally designed buildings surrounded by "Green Space."

Compare their city dumps and waste management techniques to ours!

There are over 900 Waste to Energy clean production power plants in the world accommodating hundreds of millions of people. Can they all be wrong and Dalton "McGuilty" is right?

One of us is smarter than all of them?

I don’t think so.

Hot air doesn’t keep a house warm and we’re paying a high price listening to this sort of Liberal hot air. Talk is cheap; electricity isn’t. If Canada cannot lead, it will have to follow; and following the rest of the world who incinerate their garabge is the road this Green evangelist would like to lead us down. Waste is not garbage, but a commercially valuable, renewable resource. The incineration and vaporware science is sound and we’re not going to become anyone’s guinea pig. Sweden's "burning" with enthusiasm over their incinerators and it’s time to make Sudbury Canada’s wasteland again!

We do not become world class by building more arenas when we already have more arenas than any city our size on earth. We become world class when we lead the way in municipal governance, things like making garbage a resource, not an ideology, and by creating our own electricity and jobs in innovative ways. When we are three decades behind a socialist country, when our environmental laws are not even in the same league, we are not even on the eco-radar screen of being world class.

The final fact worth remembering is that we are the ultimate source of our destiny and we do have the "Power" to choose. We might like to think the garbage disappears forever when the truck hauls it away from the curb, but this is, after all, a small planet, and materials don't leave it. They just cycle around, and sometimes they come back to haunt you.

The best way to ensure landfills and landfill greenhouse gas emissions continue to grow is to sit back, to do nothing and hope it goes away. Perception is reality and I suggest you "Deal with reality before it deals with you." However, for those who wish to participate in cleaning up this planet, don't bury your head in the sand, stand up and be accountable. Every "Green Minded Voter" should get in line with this Green Acres Philosophy and get out and rock the vote. Incinerators and Plasma arc are the future of waste disposal and uniting trash and tech is every enthusiastic environmentalists’ dream. To stay in the energy loop you simply can't combine age-old wisdom with high-tech wizardry any better.

Thus, with Ontario going to the polls this fall, action to green Ontario's energy supply and reduce global warming pollution is sure to be a hot topic. To cut through the hot air and get to real solutions to the climate crisis we need to imagine the unimaginable to avoid having to live with the unthinkable. Ontario PC leader John Tory supports Waste to Energy incinerators, although he supports Nuclear Energy as well. But with the political wherewithal for this proactive initiative, this industrial ecology project would quickly move from the pioneer stage to a climax state of stable maturity.

Political engagement enables the spread of environmentally conscious policies that can turn this vision into a reality, thus, it’s time to wake up and $mell the garbage for without public action, thoughtful individuals are "swimming upstream." The choice is your. Make it wisely.

This is the end of the rainbow.

Our Pot of Gold Awaits!

So shall we pop the cork or prepare a casket for the death of this major opportunity that is not just knocking but pounding on our door?

The notion of doing the "Green Thing” may be considered impossible or a Herculean task by some, but in truth what we need are more people who specialize in the impossible, and we have zero to lose and everything to gain by putting our best shoe forward to reform our waste and electricity production policies.

Thus, it’s time to not only re-examine the deficiencies within government but to overcome them by electing leaders who adopt “uncommon common sense” policies and business methodologies for the good of all, as we can not long afford the agenda trap of operating in our habitual non-sensible preprogrammed Twentieth Century ways.

To not do so is "crystal clear nonsense," which raises one simple, final and important question:

Where is the leadership in this country?

It's obvious to me; it doesn't exist and politicians don't care. People who do, must.

What do you think?

[Max]

Great story on Joseph Longo; the inventor of Plasma Converter System.

The Prophet of Garbage.

www.popsci.com/popsci/science/873aae7bf86c0110vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html

[Max]

admin said:

Sudbury owns Greater Sudbury Utility (GSU), which includes Greater Sudbury Hydro Inc (GSHi), but they do not produce one watt of electricity. They simply buy electricity from the province and resell it to local customers. The new landfill gas collection system at the Kingsway dump will soon produce some electricity; but the terms of the 20 year "Landfill Gas to Energy" contract is an extremely bad deal for the city.

Sudbury ratepayers spent over 10 million $ developing the waste utilization plant. The Ministry of Energy agreed to purchase electricity at 11 cents per kilowatt for 20 years, 3 cents above the assumed market price of 8 cents. However, this poorly negotiated power proposal stinks, as electricity rates will not remain at 8 cents over the next 20 years and when it reaches 12 cents we’re losing money.

Based on the reported average 500,000 $ a year rate of return, this project will not turn a profit for more than 25+ years, given the 10 million+ $ investment. Annual operating costs must be deducted from the 500,000 $ revenue source, which extends the payback period. This "methane to market" program is also a partnership with Genco, a subsidiary of GSU, who profits off this venture, which delays the payback period even more.

This project was just a money grab by the Liberal controlled Ministry of Energy who took full advance of the incompetence of Doug Craig and GSHi. This project provides no quick fix to the Greenhouse Gas being emitted into the air; and by their own admission, gases will continue to spew for 25+ years; and we’re now stuck in this deal no matter how lopsided the terms.

A bioreactor landfill is an innovative landfill management strategy called "enhanced or controlled" landfilling to manage solid waste. A bioreactor landfill operates to rapidly transform and degrade organic waste. This bioreactor concept differs from the traditional “dry tomb” municipal landfill approach.

Simply put, bioreactor landfill technology accelerates the biological decomposition of organic wastes in a landfill by promoting conditions necessary for the microorganisms that degrade the waste. The increase in waste degradation and stabilization is accomplished through the addition of liquid and air to enhance microbial processes. By efficiently designing and operating a landfill, the life of a landfill can be extended by as much as 20 years.

A bioreactor landfill is not just a single design and will correspond to the operational process invoked. There are three different general types of bioreactor landfill configurations:

Aerobic - In an aerobic bioreactor landfill, leachate is removed from the bottom layer, piped to liquids storage tanks, and re-circulated into the landfill in a controlled manner. Air is injected into the waste mass, using vertical or horizontal wells, to promote aerobic activity and accelerate waste stabilization.

Anaerobic - In an anaerobic bioreactor landfill, moisture is added to the waste mass in the form of re-circulated leachate and other sources to obtain optimal moisture levels. Biodegradation occurs in the absence of oxygen (anaerobically) and produces landfill gas. Landfill gas, primarily methane, can be captured to minimize greenhouse gas emissions and for energy projects.

Hybrid (Aerobic-Anaerobic) - The hybrid bioreactor landfill accelerates waste degradation by employing a sequential aerobic-anaerobic treatment to rapidly degrade organics in the upper sections of the landfill and collect gas from lower sections. Operation as a hybrid results in the earlier onset of methanogenesis compared to aerobic landfills.

In the bioreactor process the release of Greenhouse Gas emissions is reduced both by higher and quicker recovery rates of landfill gas and from offsetting fossil fuel use with landfill gas energy.

Waste decomposition results in the conversion of biodegradable solid waste into gas, thereby creating additional landfill space. In conventional landfills, this settlement usually occurs after landfill closure when it is too late to use the space. By accelerating the decomposition process, new landfill space is created sooner, which may be reused for additional waste placement. Recycling valuable landfill space could extend the landfill life by 20%.

Environmental Control Systems' (ECS) aerobic landfill technology uses a patented process that stabilizes waste far faster than traditional anaerobic methods, thus minimizing risk, enhancing revenues and extending the life of the facility.

Rather than waiting for the organic compounds to degrade naturally, which can take up to 30 years, ECS treats the material by injecting air and moisture directly into the waste. Degradation takes place in just one to three years, and produces a non-toxic material that can be mined, recovered or reused. That, in turn, can free up an additional 80 to 90 percent of airspace, which eliminates the need for new permits and expansions and ensures a longer-lasting facility that generates more profits.

The City of Calgary has constructed a full-scale pilot project consisting of a 100,000 tonne cell, which will operate under anaerobic and aerobic conditions. The landfill maybe mined at a later date to recover space. A landfill in Ste-Sophie Quebec and the Laflèche landfill in Moose Creek Ontario also operate as bioreactors.

Wait till we see Sudbury's bad numbers. North Bay's plan isn't working out so well.




Methane project in jeopardy

Gord Young / Osprey News Network; North Bay Nugget
Local News - Friday, July 13, 2007 @ 09:00

Expectations for the city's methane gas collection and flaring initiative at the Merrick Township landfill have fallen short, putting the project's future in question.

A staff report presented to council this week indicates the project has been marred with problems from the outset, creating a revenue shortfall of at least $357,000 in its first year of operation.

The report blames the deficit on a combination of mistaken predictions and setbacks, including inaccurate revenue and gas-flow projections, delays in getting the flaring system operational, shutdowns and operational problems, as well as the federal government's failure to establish an emission-trading program.

Coun. Judy Koziol, chair of engineering and works, said she anticipates a discussion about the project in about four weeks when consultants, Conestoga Rovers Associates, attend a committee meeting of council.


Koziol said she was aware of snags associated with the project, but didn't realize the financial ramifications until the consulting firm recently shared figures with city staff.

"I don't think we should cut it off at the knees," said Koziol, adding the project is still viable and worthwhile.

She said the problems mean the city won't reap the benefits as soon as it anticipated. But Koziol said she believes the project will pay off in the long term.

The city awarded a $1.3-million contract to H2 Ontario Ltd. last February for the construction of the first phase of the project to determine how the gas can best be utilized.

Revenue

The city hopes it can be used to generate energy and as much as $700,000 in annual revenue following the second phase - construction of a generator to convert the methane into electricity.

Final payment for the first phase, however, is now due. And the city hasn't earned the financial credits it was counting on under a federal program.

A separate confidential report concerning "litigation and contractor issues" is mentioned in the staff document outlining revenue shortfalls, and in a second report dealing with recommendations for the next phase of the project.

The report said one of the problems facing the methane project is that the electronics which monitor the flaring operation have repeatedly and unexpectedly shut down. Without those readings, the city can't cash in on as many federal emissions credits as it is likely entitled. Those problems were also exacerbated by winter temperatures.

The report also indicates that gas flow measurements have averaged about 25 per cent less than what the city expected, although the figures have recently improved.

In addition, the report states the flaring system was supposed to be operating by mid-August 2006, but was not up and running until mid-September, with final completion delayed until late in the year. The city also expected an additional $123,000 to put toward the project through an emission-trading program that was supposed to be in place when the current program - created by the Liberals to meet Kyoto Accord targets - expires at the end of the year.

But no such program has been created, despite a commitment by the federal Conservatives to introduce a replacement.

Staff recommended the city use landfill reserves to pay for the $357,000 shortfall and the $123,000 it anticipated to earn after this year.

Staff said council should also be briefed on the operational issues of the flaring system, which measures and burns off methane gas.

[secretsquirrel]

I skimmed over this article and found it quite intriguing. Unfortunately there is so much here that I need to sit down when I've got the time to read the whole thing.
Good thoughts.
By comparison, this is small beans, but I find it annoying to drive by Delke Doze (SP??) park at 2:30 in the morning and see approximately 80,000 watts of lighting on over the field, when no one is there using it!!!

[Max]

I’m very detail oriented by nature. I look forward to your comments. In short, this project has the potential to bring Sudbury over 2 billion $ in new virgin revenue and create over 2000 jobs. Two thousand 45,000 $ per year jobs would have an additional 90 million $ annual impact on Sudbury!

[Max]

secretsquirrel said:

By comparison, this is small beans, but I find it annoying to drive by Delke Doze (SP??) park at 2:30 in the morning and see approximately 80,000 watts of lighting on over the field, when no one is there using it!!!

This takes place at most if not all fields. Carmichael has lights on until midnight on weekends and no one is even using the fields.

Baseball ends in early September and the lights are on during the week too until late September. The city is aware of when the ball season ends because you have to rent the fields from them.

This has been going on for years. I called and complained long ago. Nothing is done about it.

Tennis courts have lights on in the fall when it’s minus C weather and no one is using the courts, too.

The ratepayer have to pay for this waste just so GSU can make a profit.

[Max]

Proposal smells bad to residents; Compost facility plan sparks odour, environmental worries

Laura Stradiotto
Local News Sudbury Star - Wednesday, September 05, 2007 @ 09:00

Noelville residents are raising a stink over the potential development of a recycling and composting facility in their community.

If the project moves forward, residents fear they'll soon see - and smell - the transportation and treatment of recyclable and compost material from across Ontario.

On Aug.15, French River council approved a rezoning application by Halton Recycling Ltd. to rezone 330 acres of land it plans to purchase from private landowners for waste management.

While the company's initial plan is to use 50 acres or less of land for a recycling and composing plant, residents are concerned with the future use of the remaining land.

The parcel of land is located on Highway 535, about four kilometres north of Noelville, near a water system that connects to a major lake.

Daniel Dupuis is bringing a petition to councillors at a committee of the whole meeting at 7 tonight at the Alban Community Centre. The petition is calling on councillors to overturn their original decision to approve the rezoning application.

"The problem is right where they want to build, there's a water system that dumps into all the local lakes," said Dupuis.

Nearby Pine Creek leads into swamps and marshland, but eventually flows into Lake Nipissing, he said.


Another concern is the foul odour organic material produces.

"Decomposed organic matter emits a nauseating odour which may reach a large distance in prevailing wind," said Dupuis.

The company operates a number of plants in southern Ontario, including in Newmarket where a few years ago the town demanded the company resolve the odour issue.

A city and Ministry of the Environment official determined the odour was caused by compost material that was incorrectly processed.

Aside from the environment concerns, residents are worried about increased traffic, noise and air pollution, as well as the potential negative impact on moose and other wildlife.

More than 200 residents attended a public meeting Aug. 25 to oppose the development. And while the issue is not up for public discussion tonight, residents plan to show their opposition in numbers.

However, Bill Palmer, environmental consultant for Halton Recycling Ltd., said the project won't harm the water system.

"We won't be drawing water from any of the surrounding lakes," he said.

"All of water is captured on site and reused so we're not going to be putting any pollutants into the waterways."

Palmer said the plan is to process organic material in Newmarket and then treat it in Noelville. The Noelville facility will generate about $75,000 in municipal taxes and employ about 18 people, he said.

"The project cannot start up until there is a certificate of approval given to us by the Ministry of Environment," said Palmer.

The province is pushing for less waste in landfills and "if we're able to divert 35 per cent of material from landfill, that will make a tremendous contribution," he said.

Palmer said there are no other developments planned for the 330-acres of land. The company wants to purchase the large parcel of property so there would be limited impact to surrounding residents. "It's out of the way," he said.

Palmer said the company is going to keep the public informed at each step.

French River Mayor Collin Bourgeois said the company approached the municipality a few years ago about developing a facility there.

Greater Sudbury's planning committee approved the rezoning application, but it was conditional upon consent from the municipality French River, he said.

"So when ... you're looking to attract new businesses and encourage economic development, when the planning board says it fits within the zoning, then usually a municipality will go along with what the planning board has said," said Bourgeois.

He emphasized the company still needs approval from the Ministry of Environment to open a recycling and composting plant.

"They have to get the proper permits from the proper ministries," he said.

"The municipality can't control that."

Bourgeois said the municipality can rescind its rezoning decision, which would immediately stop the project.

"But there's a legal liability to that," he said.

If the company has spent money conducting studies, then the municipality would be liable for that cost.

At tonight's meeting, Bourgeois said council may draw up a resolution to rescind its original decision. But if that does happen, a final decision whether to rescind the rezoning application wouldn't be made until the next council meeting, in two weeks time. "At this point informally I've spoken to most of the councillors and no one has come to a clear cut decision," said Bourgeois.