Vancouver officials rethink plans to build new incinerator

Metro Vancouver is rethinking its plan to build another waste incinerator now that people are throwing less garbage out and diverting waste more to recycling and compost. According to an article on the CBC/Radio-Canada website, the proposed plant site was cut in half a few months ago, and now officials aren’t certain there will be enough waste to feed the smaller-proposed 250,000-metric-ton-per-year plant.

Waste will head to the landfill while officials reevaluate the plan, the article says. Port Coquitlam Mayor Greg Moore, is cited in the article as saying the incinerator or some other form of waste-to-energy conversion plant is the future for garbage in Metro Vancouver. He notes municipal efforts to increase recycling and composting are effective and have cut the amount of waste to about half of what officials were expecting as little as five years ago.

Moore says expects the region will keep researching and pick the best kind of waste-to-energy model that works for the scale and type of waste being thrown away over the next year.