DUBLINERS are to be widely consulted as part of a major strategic study of waste disposal options for the city and county after the Kill dump in Co Kildare is exhausted in less than a decade.
The four Dublin local authorities have commissioned a team of consultants, including the Copenhagen Environmental Protection Agency, to examine the options for dealing with the city's growing waste mountain up to 2015.
The study will review the volume and composition of waste in the Dublin area and examine its suitability for reuse, recycling, composting and energy recovery. It will also assess the scope for minimising the generation of waste.
Mr Jim Fenwick, city engineer, said yesterday that "nothing is being ruled in or ruled out". But he, confirmed that "waste to energy" - involving the use of incineration - would be one of the options examined by the consultants.
For the past 20 years, Copenhagen has incinerated its municipal waste and used the recovered energy to fuel a district heating scheme. Its involvement in the Dublin study means that incineration is bound to feature as an option.
Asked how they could overcome public fears, even hysteria, about the environmental effects of incineration, Mr Fenwick said new EU standards and modern techniques meant emissions could be very strictly controlled.
The traditional approach of finding a convenient "hole in the ground" was no longer tenable. EU standards for landfill sites meant that this route would become an increasingly expensive option, making waste to energy more viable.
"Kill is just a blip in the whole picture; you can write it off in 10 years, said Mr Fenwick. "What we are looking for is a solution to the waste problem, which has been a Cinderella for too long way below water and sewerage.
"Industry and householders will have to minimise, reuse and recycle much more of the waste they currently generate - and pay for its disposal," he said, adding that food accounted for 40 per cent of all domestic refuse.
More than 900,000 tonnes of waste are generated in the greater Dublin area annually and this figure is rising by 2 per cent a year. At present, there is no incentive to reduce the volume and no charge for disposing of it.
Mr P.J. Rudden, of consultants M.C. O'Sullivan, who are co ordinating the study, said there would be public exhibitions on the waste issue between mid April and mid May, giving the consultants perceptions of the problem and how it might be addressed. They would also be circulating 100 interested groups.
