New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian says plans for the State Government to back Dial A Dump Industries’ bid for the world’s largest incinerator is “news to her”.
In March, Dial A Dump Industries’ chief executive Ian Malouf said the $700 million energy-from-waste plant at Eastern Creek would proceed because the State Government wanted the project.
Last week, Ms Berejiklian told News Corp she was not aware of that and suggested Mr Malouf email details for The Next Generation plant to her office. She said she had confidence in the Environmental Protection Authority’s guidelines.
“A lot of proposals like that have not been approved and the EPA guidelines are very strict,’’ she said.
Mr Malouf said in 2014 the State Government introduced an energy-from-waste policy with the EPA.
He said the policy recognised “the recovery of energy and resources from the thermal processing of waste has the potential … to deliver positive outcomes for the community and the environment”.
In April, the company told Waste Management World the Next Generation facility will be built to the latest European and Australian engineering and environmental standards. This would include technology that captures any particulate matter and adsorbs heavy metals and dioxins, while cleaning any gases before they reach the atmosphere.
The company said that this would mean that outputs would be below the limits set out by the New South Wales Environmental Protection Agency and the very strict European directives, and in many cases would not even be detectable. The facility’s pollution controls will be monitored by the EPA 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
“Emissions from the facility will have less impact than a person holding a burning sparkler at a birthday party, emitting less chloride, dust and nitrous oxides,” Mr Malouf said.
“By converting residual waste into power, the facility will prevent the release of 3 million tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere and divert over 1 million tonnes of waste from landfill each year”.