John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)

As regards this project, I am not claiming that I have specific powers. However, while I am not pre-empting the outcome of the review, I said repeatedly in the House that if the review carefully examines the figures that have been supplied to me and which I have issued in the House concerning the total municipal waste arising, which is about 3.2 million tonnes, it can be reduced by recycling. If one has a 50% recycling rate, and with mechanical biological treatment or MBT, one can raise that substantially — it can be reduced to about 1.7 million tonnes, and it can be reduced even further with MBT. The national figure I gave here was between 400,000 and 600,000 tonnes. The emphasis has to be on MBT.

As was mentioned, I was in Bali last week where the Austrian environment minister launched an MBT plant. That is the way to go. As regards climate change, I am conscious of the fact that replacing a hole-in-the-ground landfill simply by putting everything into a fire is not a sustainable method of dealing with waste in the long term.

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