Call to reduce waste in Duleek

The people of Meath have been urged to make a concerted effort to slash the amount of waste produced in order to make the opening of the proposed incinerator at Duleek unviable. Shock and dismay has greeted the news that work on the country"s first commercial incinerator is to begin at Carranstown, Duleek, next month and anti-incineration campaigners say that waste reduction is now their best weapon. They have told Environment Minister John Gormely that he has three years to come up with a comprehensive system to reduce the amount of waste we produce. 'We have three years before the incinerator will be ready for operation and if we can reduce the amount of waste we produce by reducing, reusing and recycling, then we could make it unprofitable for them to operate the incinerator,' said Pat O"Brien of the No Incineration Alliance. Mr O"Brien, who with other local residents has been battling against the incinerator for more than a decade, said he had been shocked by last week"s announcement that work would start on the incinerator in August. 'Our biggest challenge now is to ensure that the incinerator is no longer viable,' he said. Mr O"Brien said that great strides had been made regarding recycling and the local community had done all they could but now all the necessary infrastructure should be put in place to reduce the amount of waste produced even further. 'My fear is that if incineration goes ahead, it will disincentify the recycing procress,' he said. Green Party councillor Tom Kelly said this week that he would be investigating if a European Court of Justice ruling last week could have implications on the incinerator project. He pointed to last week"s ruling in Luxembourg that a failure to mandate environmental impact assessments before projects began was breaking EU law. He said this could have implications on the second planning application relating to the incinerator. Cllr Anne Dillon Gallagher said she was hugely disappointed that the work would soon be starting. She was unhappy about the amount of traffic the project would generate and said the roads in the area could not cope with the level of traffic. She said that incineration was unnecessary and there should be more efforts to 'reduce, reuse, recycle'. Cllr Jimmy Cudden said he had objected to the incinerator and didn"t want it to go ahead, but with the Government pushing for incineration, it was always going to happen. 'We have tried everything we could but to no avail. It was inevitable it would come to this because the Government were pushing for it,' he said. Cllr Cudden said that the area seemed to have been earmakred for undesirable development. Locals in Duleek last week were mainly worried about the effect of the incinerator on Health. 'We have no idea what effect this will have on us or on our food. Incineration produces dioxins, which are dangerous,' said local Lee Maguire. 'I am sick of listening to all the arguments over the years but now that it is happening, I am worried about the implications on my family"s health,' a local woman stated. Indaver, the company behind the incinerator, will today (Wednesday) from 2pm to 6pm hold a Construction Information Afternoon in the Boyne Valley Hotel in Drogheda. The Project Team will be available to discuss the construction phase and any suggestions, queries or concerns the public may have about the development of the facility. Work on the waste-to-energy facility in Carranstown is due to start this August.