Exporting rubbish will cost taxpayer

OUT of 34 county councils and the main city councils, six have now closed their main household refuse dumps and another 22 face closure within the next five years, unless they get licensing from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which is by no means guaranteed.

Various regional waste management plans call for incineration, but no municipal incineration plant has been built. The only municipal plant that has secured planning permission is in Carranstown, Co Meath, which will be run by a private company, but even that is subject to a High Court appeal.

Cork City Council is faced with a problem as the Kinsale Road landfill site will close on the January 1, 2005 and the replacement site at Bottlehill has not been licensed by the EPA yet. The council has therefore advertised for private contractors to handle the waste for 18 months until mid-2006.

Unless incinerators are introduced, the mounting waste management crisis could force the large-scale exportation of waste. Councils in counties Kildare, Leitrim, Longford, Meath, Sligo and Wicklow have had to close their main dumps and they are using the landfill dumps in neighbouring counties, which are nearing the end of their life cycle.

The National Waste Database Report, which was published by the EPA last month, indicates that the generation of household waste increased by 20.3% between 1998 and 2001. The level of commercial waste increased by 53.3% and construction and demolition waste generation was up by 35% in the same period.

These increases are attributed largely to the Celtic tiger which was still very strong in 2001, the last year covered by the report.

Despite those increases already cited, however the level of waste generation has actually been declining. The total quantity of waste generated decreased by 7.5%, from 80 million tonnes in 1998 to 74 million tonnes in 2001.

There is no disparity in the figures, because items such as household and commercial waste really make up a tiny portion of the overall problem comprising just 3.7% of total waste. Construction and demolition generates 4.9% while manufacturing contributes 6.9%.

The largest producer of waste is by far the agricultural sector, which accounts for 76.5% of the total. The quantity of this agricultural waste has actually decreased by 12.2% much of this was comprised of slurries, which were largely managed by spreading them as fertilisers.

In addition to the decline in agricultural waste, there has been some progress in other areas. Recycling rates have increased. The waste industry is now more comprehensively regulated, and the statistics that it produces are more reliable, with the result that a more balanced infrastructure is being developed for waste management.

But the greatest waste of all will be that of the taxpayers' money, if we are saddled with paying to export our rubbish.

Having earned a reputation as exporters of high-quality technical goods and luxury items such as crystal, special textiles, and prime foods, it would be crazy to expose that international reputation to ridicule by exporting our rubbish.