Waste Not! Carroll

Originally published January 29, 2012 - Frederick News Post

Here are the facts: The prior Frederick County Board of Commissioners approved a waste-to-energy incinerator as "the best of a poor lot of choices," according to at least two of the commissioners.Over its 30-year life span it will cost the taxpayers of Frederick and Carroll counties approximately $2 billion to pay off and operate, not including major overhauls and Environmental Protection Agency-mandated changes. And after paying it off, someone else will own it, which maybe isn't so bad. By the way, those self-imposed choices were limited to three: a new landfill, long-haul trucking and the incinerator.

Based on what we are paying for long-haul transport and dumping fees today (approximately $8.5 million for 2011), the 30-year cost of business as usual with a 3 percent annual escalator similar to the percentage increase the Northeast Maryland Waste Disposal Authority used to raise its annual management fees to the two counties involved, the total 30-year cost would approximate $401 million.

So the taxpayers will spend five times what we would spend if we stayed with the current process (and instead focused our collective energies on improving/expanding recycling and composting), in order to burn garbage and add poisons to the air we breathe and water some folks drink.

Other municipalities around the country with forward-thinking leadership are achieving 80 to 90 percent recycling/composting. Why can't we? Best case, even with this $2 billion monstrosity, we will be left with 20 to 25 percent waste to be landfilled in some manner. So where is the gain? Bottom line, there is none, only pain!

We know that wastewater will be used to cleanse the incinerator works and then it will be dumped into a pipe to be fed directly into the Potomac, where a poison diffuser will stir it up so as to make it look like the bad stuff such as mercury has vanished. But it hasn't, and it will make its way to the Chesapeake Bay, where ultimately the rocks, and other fish and seafood we consume will take it in.

What doesn't go down the pipe will go up the chimney to again be diffused into the air we breathe. And let's not forget that 20 percent or so that is left over as ash, which will be trucked and landfilled somewhere, may be spread over farmland or used as landfill cover. You should be aware that this incinerator will be allowed to generate up to 90 pounds every year of mercury and that as little as half a teaspoon of this stuff can contaminate a 300-acre lake.

Now here comes the best part. The current BoCC advised us last month that it is "forging ahead" no matter what we think about the above. Last summer, our governor took a hefty contribution from the folks that make these incinerators, and shortly thereafter decided that they are the greenest form of energy generation. He signed a bill elevating them to Tier 1 status despite statements plainly visible on the EPA website indicating that they generate dioxins and numerous other poisons into the environment. And just this week we find out the BoCC is "reeling at the potential costs of watershed plan," which approximate an additional $4 billion to Frederick County taxpayers.

Do you see the irony of these activities at the state and county level?

We will pay five times more to generate additional poisons into the environment, including the bay, and then will pay this enormous additional amount to clean it up. All the while we will continue to generate more poisons that we will have to pay more to clean up.

Is this the kind of governance we want in Frederick and Carroll counties and in our state, and do you want Frederick to become the state capital for tire burning?

I surely hope not!

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Gary J. Thuro

writes from Frederick.