Renewables

Waste-to-Energy Part 3 - Incineration

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(excerpt)

by Joyce Nelson

Preferential Treatment

In Canada, the federal government has been doling out funding to the waste-to-energy (WTE) sector, with billions of dollars available both for WTE companies and for municipalities to invest in WTE incineration via P3s.

For years, the point-man on the WTE incineration issue

Waste-To-Energy, Part 2 - Covanta

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by Joyce Nelson

With the November 2009 release of Metro Vancouver's draft "Integrated Solid Waste and Resource Management Plan," the Greater Vancouver Region is formally on the path to building one or more waste-to-energy (WTE) incinerators by 2015.

Incinerators - Waste-to-Energy Proposals

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by Joyce Nelson

Across Canada, the US, the UK, Europe, and Asia, communities are facing an unprecedented onslaught of proposals for new incinerators. In July 2008, Friends of the Earth released a map showing dozens of planned new incinerator sites across the UK. The British government has committed billions to new incineration, while cutting budgets for recycling by 30 per cent.

Germany, which already has such an over-capacity of incineration that it imports millions of tonnes of

Going Up to the Landfill in the Sky

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by Delores Broten

Its proponents call it “Waste to Energy” or WTE, but recycling advocates call it “The Landfill in the Sky.” The great incineration debate, which the environmental movement had pretty well won across North America, is back with a vengeance. Metro Vancouver is considering several incinerators as a solution to its municipal solid waste (MSW) garbage problem.

Right now, BC leads North America in responsible actions around waste.

Inadequate Paper Recycling Programs in Canada

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by Joyce Nelson

The Environmental Paper Network (EPN) has some sobering figures on paper recycling, including this: “After more than 30 years of recycled-paper market development, recycled content has reached the dizzying height of 6 per cent of the overall fibre that goes into printing and writing papers.” And only 3 per cent of that is post-consumer recycled content. In their article for Resource Recycling (June 2009), Pam Blackledge (of EPN) and Susan Kinsella (of Conservatree) write, “Put another way, more than 90 per cent of the printing and office paper available in North America still has no recycled content at all.”

Sustaining Environment By Recycling Metal

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by Joyce Nelson

Metals can be used and recycled through the economy almost without limit. Fewer Mines = Less Pollution = Less GHGs

“One of the beauties of steel is you can keep recycling it. It is infi­nitely recyclable,” says Ron Watkins, president of the Canadian Steel Pro­ducers Association.

Greed and Black Liquor Fuel Pulp Trade Wars

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by Rob Wiltzen

When US lawmakers unveiled the new Highway Act of 2005, they likely weren’t aiming to ignite a global trade dispute in the forest products sector. The Act was alleged­ly designed to increase the alternative and renewable fuel mixtures powering the transportation of America. The legislation, however, was fatally flawed in its vague eligibility criteria. The rollout of the tax credits translated to a massive subsidy for the American pulp industry.  

Pulp mills claim the tax credit for burning black liquor, a

BC Hydro Over Supply, Deficit, and IPPs

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by Erik Andersen

The Gordon Campbell/Christy Clark energy policies have pillaged BC Hydro of the equity that employees contributed and created. I feel sorry for the employees, who do not understand that their contributions have been squandered for the benefit of others. When the predator class gets sight of a sound balance sheet - as BC Hydro once had - it is slaughtered like an innocent

Plans for Renewable Energy - Spin and Lies for a Global Energy Grid

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by Joyce Nelson

The people of BC have been told repeatedly that the province is a "net importer" of electricity and needs to become "self-sufficient" - claims that are used to justify everything from "run of river" independent power producers (IPPs), to energy mega-projects such as Bute Inlet and the Site C dam. But a US electricity expert told me that California has been "buying a tremendous amount of power from BC over the past decade."

Is Biomass Renewable Energy?

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by Stephen Leahy

North Carolina's Scot Quaranda is terrified that the southern United States plans on becoming the Saudi Arabia of biomass. But isn't biomass a renewable source of clean and green energy?

"Not when you're burning trees," says Quaranda, the Communications Director of the Dogwood Alliance, a coalition of 70 citizens' organizations trying to

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"This is it. It's done!" was the message in Alaska in 2008, 19 years after the Exxon Valdes oil spill.  Dave Janka, who runs Auklet Charters in Prince William Sound, ran his boat over to Smith Island to snap this photo.  Dave says, "It's far from done!"

W.L.M. (Bill) Wilson writes: 'Attached is my rewrite of Anne Feeney’s “Have You Been To Jail for Justice”. Anne granted permission to do non-profit performances of this Enbridge version.' Video by Ester Strijbos.