Manila/Berkeley/Geneva/Maidstone 14th July 2003. More than 235 groups from 62 countries today took action against waste incineration to serve notice to their national and local governments that time is running out for polluting incineration despite vigorous attempts by the pyromaniac elements of the waste industry to repackage their burners as ‘Safe’ or ‘Renewable Energy’ or ‘Advanced Thermal Technologies’ for waste disposal.

SAGE (Southeast Action Group for the Environment), REACT!, Canterbury Friends of the Earth and representatives from other green groups thoroughout Kent will be undertaking a Day of Action Against Waste Incineration in our County. There will be a tour of approved and planned incinerator sites, we will also be making a presentation of the new and exciting GAIA document “Waste Incineration: A Dying Technology” (see below *) at 2.00pm on the steps of County Hall, (dependant on anyone from KCC making themselves available, they could not be bothered last year, we will either do the presentation to a KCC Officer or Councillor or we will engage in some street theatre). We will finish the day with a Zero Waste Picnic (anything left over should be reusable, recyclable or compostable, hence Zero Waste) at Teston Bridge near Maidstone.

A rough guide to our running times will be made available upon request. Journalists attending the KCC presentation, if you would like to receive your own copy of the documents that we hope to present to KCC please contact us before 10.00 am on Monday the 14th of July.

Here in Kent we already have one giant incinerator approved by KCC for Allington near Maidstone, we are currently struggling to stop the unproven and untested Australian SWERF (Solid Waste of Energy Recycling Facility) planned for the beautiful historic City of Canterbury. Groups in Kent have already successfully fought off proposal for Richborough, near Sandwich and Ridham Dock near Sittingbourne. On the outskirts of Kent, the group BADAIR is fighting the UK’s biggest incinerator proposal, to be built in Belvedere, the plan is currently at Public Inquiry.

We expect more facilities to be planned for Kent in the coming years, as our County struggles to play ‘catch up’ with the better performing Counties recycling figures and as the Governments housing plans for Kent push the County population beyond sustainable levels. We are also very worried that SEERA (South East England Regional Assembly) in its recent Draft Regional Waste Management Strategy stated that it believed that we needed another 25 large or 61 small incinerators to be built within the South East in the next 10 years; it is very likely that a proportion of these will be built in Kent.

“With growing desperation to ensure the survival of their dying industry, incinerator pushers are scrambling to repackage and reinvent their technologies using various forms of greenwashing including referring to incinerators as clean, renewable energy sources or claiming to have ‘new’ variations like pyrolysis or gasification for the same old and discredited process,” said Ann Leonard, Co-Coordinator of the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives (GAIA), which unites over 375 groups and communities fighting to end wasting and burning, from 77 countries.

The combined and simultaneous protest actions around the world mark the observance of the 2nd Global Day of Action against Waste Incineration, by far the most massive demonstration of public opposition to incinerators on a global scale. Spearheaded by GAIA, and supported by groups across the UK, the yearly anti-incineration day of action intends to highlight the health, environmental, economic and social problems associated with waste burning and other polluting waste management practices, and at the same time promote safe and sustainable alternatives for preventing waste and managing society’s discards.

“Today’s actions are a clear manifestations of the growing resistance against incinerators and other dirty forms of waste disposal. With the possible exception of nuclear power and the GM issue, perhaps no other technology has stirred up such inflamed defiance from citizens and communities the world over. For this and other good reasons, KCC should pay heed and start implementing safe and sustainable alternatives to incineration,” said Phil Scott of SAGE

Public opposition has killed many proposed and existing incinerators worldwide. For instance, a massive grassroots movement has defeated more than 300 municipal waste incinerator proposals in the United States in the last 15 years and the Philippines, has banned all incineration. Even the UK Government in its recent review of its own Waste Strategy 2000 stated that they believe ‘Incineration is not politically deliverable’ stated Greg MacGregor of REACT!

It is time our County Council stopped relying on dinosaur technologies, that amount to little more than big bonfires in big buildings to move away from these polluting monsters and forward toward a more sustainable solution to the futures waste problems. The County Council needs to join the many other UK and overseas authorities and put in place, achievable, non polluting and sustainable Zero Waste Policies, before the Garden of England becomes the Burner of Britain. Said Elleanor Scott of the Zero Waste Chartists UK.

* GAIA today released the report “Waste Incineration: A Dying Technology,” which explains why incinerators are an unsustainable and obsolete method for dealing with waste. The GAIA report concludes that incineration is a dying technology. As a waste treatment technology, it is unreliable and produces a secondary waste stream more dangerous than the original. As an energy production method, it is inefficient and wasteful of resources. As an economic development tool, it is a catastrophe, which drains money out of local communities and creates scarce and often dangerous jobs.

This year’s action surpasses the number of participating groups from last year’s Global Day of Action that drew 126 groups from 54 countries.

NOTE:

The GAIA Report “Waste Incineration: A Dying Technology" is available for free download at www.no-burn.org The Report discusses the problems with waste incineration and explains viable alternatives to this outdated method for dealing with waste. The report further talks about the expanding repudiation of incineration across the globe, including incinerator bans and moratoria imposed in several places. Neil Tangri, formerly of Essential Action USA wrote the report for GAIA.

Contacts:
For information on local incinerator issues and activities, please contact
Phil Scott of SAGE Phone: 07931 943749. E-mail: sage.kent@britishlibrary.net
Greg Macgregor of REACT! Phone: 07905 887389. E-mail: ReactAction@hotmail.com

We will be available through out the day to do live and some on-site interviews.

For information on GAIA and the Global Day of Action, please visit www.no-burn.org