Questions arise at incinerator open house

(Update)

Concerns are being raised about a waste-to-energy facility that’s being proposed for Hamilton’s port lands. Port Fuels and Material Services wants to build a thermal conversion plant at pier 15 on Sherman Avenue North. An open house was held Thursday night for the public to ask questions. But some are criticizing the company for holding meeting the night before the long weekend — and with little notice.

The word “incinerator” is enough to set off alarm bells in Hamilton’s east end. The SWARU plant closed down in 2002 after years of complaints about air pollution. But Bob Clark of Port Fuels and Material Services says its waste-to-energy facility would be different: “It’s not incineration. And it’s not combustion because in gasification you have deprivation of oxygen and there is no flame.”

Clark says the process creates gasified fluid which goes into a plasma conversion chamber — cracking the compounds molecular structure at very high temperatures. What’s left is a synthetic gas: “The synthetic gas goes into, for example, a gas engine. That gas engine has an emission. So theoretically, it’s as close to emissions free as possible.”

But it’s not necessarily the technology that has some residents worried so much as transparency. One man wondered why the meeting was held outside his ward.

Sean Hurley is a resident: “We live in the neighbourhood where they’re putting it. They did plan to do it before a long weekend. They also didn’t provide very much notification.”

The pier 15 location would fall under the Hamilton Port Authority’s jurisdiction. City councillor Chad Collins says it’s concerning that there seems to be no public consultation beyond this open house: “The rumour is that they’re strictly going through their environmental assessment at the provincial and federal level but there is no municipal application that’s been put yet. Our planning staff are not aware of that.”

Clark says an environmental screening is now underway. But even if all goes according the company’s plan they’re still a year away from putting it into action. Clark says it’s too early to say how much the project would cost.