Community Divided Over $1.5 Billion Waste-to-Energy Incinerator Proposal

Topic: Recycling and Waste Management

The incinerator will be built in the Bromelton state development area.

In short:

Waste company Cleanaway wants to build a waste-to-energy incinerator near Beaudesert.

Supporters say it could ease Queensland’s landfill crisis, while opponents have raised concerns.

What's next?

The plans have been submitted to Queensland's coordinator-general.

A proposed $1.5 billion waste-to-energy incinerator has split a community.

Waste company Cleanaway has put forward plans for the Bromelton Energy and Resource Centre.

If approved, the facility would process 760,000 tonnes of waste each year.

According to Cleanaway, that would divert about 12 per cent of Queensland's waste from landfill.

The incinerator would burn rubbish at temperatures of about 850 degrees.

The plant works by burning waste to heat a boiler, which creates steam that drives a turbine.

Waste-to-energy plants already operate in Western Australia.

But while supporters say the Scenic Rim proposal could bring jobs and investment, some residents are opposed.

Health concerns

Lizz Hills is a member of Keep the Scenic Rim Scenic, a community group.

She said she joined Cleanaway's community advisory group with an open mind.

Lizz Hills is part of the Keep the Scenic Rim Scenic group.

She said she feared pollutants coming out of the flue.

"I don't want them anywhere near my family."

"If we've got two major capital cities going 'let's not put incinerators here', why would we accept one?"

Keep the Scenic Rim Scenic was initially established to oppose coal seam gas expansion.

A 'safe alternative to landfill'

Cleanaway said the facility would use combustion controls, flue-gas treatment and continuous monitoring.

The company said 99.9 per cent of emissions from the facility's flue stack would consist of gases already present.

These include nitrogen and oxygen, along with carbon dioxide.

The rubbish would burn at about 850 degrees, which Cleanaway said would remove harmful compounds.

About 0.1 per cent of the emissions would be compounds that would need to be monitored.

"The BERC is not an incinerator like we have come to know them from decades past."

"This technology is always improving and thousands of modern energy from waste facilities prove that this is a safe alternative."

The company said it would make emissions monitoring data public.

Experts divided on health impacts

Peter Tait from the Australian Public Health Association said older generations of incinerators had been linked to cancers.

Peter Tait says he is sceptical of health claims made about new generation waste incinerators.

Dr Tait said any future facility would need close monitoring.

Damien Batstone from the University of Queensland's Australian Centre for Water and Environmental Biotechnology said recent reviews had found no evidence.

He said new plants were far more advanced than earlier generations.

"We're now in generation four or five of waste incinerator technology, so gaseous management is very effective now."

"You've got things like dioxins, heavy metals, polyaromatic hydrocarbons and a number of other contaminants like PFAS that need to be removed."

Damien Batstone says incinerators are only a medium term solution to the waste issue.

Incinerators a 'medium-term measure'

Professor Batstone said waste-to-energy should be seen as an interim measure while Australia moved towards a circular economy.

"[Landfill] is starting to run out," he said.

We need better options to manage waste in the long term.

He said while Australia was "on the way" to a circular economy — the country was not there yet.

Over the next 20 to 30 years, we will move in that direction.

He said the technology was expensive and warned any proposal would also need to manage issues.

Thousands of new homes are expected to be built in Beaudesert in the coming years.

Incinerator's economic boost

Back in Beaudesert, local chamber of commerce president John Powell said he believed the project could help support the region's rapid growth.

"We've got 4,000 new homes coming here in the next 15 years, that's 20,000 extra people," he said.

Mr Powell said he hoped the Bromelton State Development Area could eventually become a broader circular economy precinct.

He said he believed waste-to-energy incineration should only be used as a "last option" for material that could not be recycled.

Mr Powell said he had confidence government agencies would monitor the facility and ensure it met environmental standards.

Cleanaway submitted a planning application to the Office of the Coordinator-General in March.

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