More rubbish incinerated than going to landfill

In a major turnaround, more Irish household and commercial rubbish is being burnt in incinerators and used to power cement kilns than is going to landfill.

However, this increased reliance on incineration means recycling rates are dropping, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Recycling rates dropped by 22% between 2012 and 2011.

Municipal waste is powering the Indaver incinerator at Duleek, Co Meath, which takes 200,000 tonnes of waste annually and the country’s cement kilns are increasingly using waste-derived fuel. Waste firms are also increasingly exporting waste-derived fuel to waste- to-energy plants overseas.