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Kidderminster incinerator protest
31 March 2001
Picture Opportunity
Local residents are mounting a demonstration this Saturday (31 March)against a proposal to build a massive incinerator in Kidderminster. The incinerator will burn waste that should be recycled, destroying valuable resources, threatening health and leading to an increase in traffic. Over 1500 letters of objection to the planning application have been sent to the county council and 15,000 people have signed an anti-incinerator petition. Next month (9 April) Worcestershire County Council's Planning and Regulatory Committee is meeting to decide the planning application.
Earlier this month a Committee of MPs slammed the Government's waste strategy for leaving “the door open to a big expansion of large scale incineration of household waste.” Incineration, they said “will never play a major role in truly sustainable management”.
Saturday's demonstration is organised by local action group Stop the Kidderminster Incinerator (SKI), Friends of the Earth and the CPRE. Speakers opposing the incinerator will include all the prospective parliamentary candidates and the leader of Wyre Forest District Council. The Kidderminster incinerator would burn150,000 tonnes of Worcestershire's municipal waste each year - over 40 per cent of the total. Worcestershire only recycles 10% of it's household waste (DETR figures), and does not even have a waste local plan.
Clare Cassidy of SKI said:
“ Why should Kidderminster residents suffer the toxic pollution and lorry traffic from an incinerator we neither want or need? Give us better recycling facilities. That would be a far greener and healthier solution to the waste problem.”“
The West Midlands already has 5 incinerators, more than any other English region . FOE is calling for more recycling and composting - every household in the country should have a doorstep recycling scheme -instead of more landfill or incineration. Up to 80% of household waste could be recycled and composted.Germany, Switzerland, Austria and the Netherlands all recycle over 50%.
Sarah Oppenheimer, Waste Campaigner at Friends of the Earth said:
“Communities in Hull, Sussex, Surrey, Kent, Wrexham, Grimsby, Kidderminster and many other areas are fighting plans for a rash of giant incinerators across the country. But over three quarters of our waste could be recycled or composted. Instead of destroying valuable resources and producing toxic fumes and ash from incineration, we should minimise, reuse and recycle more, and all households should have doorstep recycling collection services.”
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Published by Friends of the Earth Trust
Last modified: Jun 2008
