Stop Camden using Edmonton incinerator

Currently less than 30% of north London rubbish and only 10% of recyclable plastic is recycled compared to over 60% in the rest of the country: nearly 90% of our black/orange bag rubbish is burnt as “skyfill” in the present old Edmonton incinerator. The NLWA is in charge of this, and our two representative Councillors on their board are Richard Olszewski and Adam Harrison. The seven local authorities are Barnet, Camden, Enfield, Hackney, Haringey, Islington and Waltham Forest.

Camden Council and the UK government have both declared a Climate and Ecological Emergency, and are committed to halting and reversing carbon emissions. This means we cannot go on pouring greenhouse gases and carbon emissions into the air increasing global warming; and toxins and particulates from burning plastic into the air for the local community in Edmonton damaging their health.

Instead of taking the opportunity of the current incinerator reaching the end of its days to establish greener solutions to disposing of our domestic and commercial rubbish, the intention is to build an even bigger incinerator which will release 700,000 tons of CO2 a year for 50 years or more. This sustains the creation of garbage and burning plastic, is an inefficient way to generate power and will cost £1.2 billion of taxpayers’ money.

We need manufacturers to make less plastic and take responsibility for what they create. We need our rubbish to be responsibly sorted for recycling. In 2015 when the decision was taken, there was not the awareness of the damage the new incinerator would cause, nor meaningful public consultation. It looked like a solution to allowing us to carry on generating waste and polluting the planet. There is no excuse now.

This petition calls on Camden Council and our MP to withdraw support for the new Edmonton Incinerator and also to use their influence with the North London Waste Authority (NLWA), the GLA, the UK government: Secretary of State and shadow Secretary, and north London Local Authorities to halt and review the construction of a new incinerator at Edmonton for 2025.

The NLWA must carry out a full, statistically reliable, independent environmental and social impact assessment of the proposed new Edmonton incinerator taking account of:

a. individual local councils’ climate emergency commitments;
b. the UK government’s 2050 net-zero commitment;
c. the European exclusion of waste-to-energy incineration from a list of economic activities considered ‘sustainable finance’;
d. the expected change in waste streams due to increased recycling rates;
e. the potential to use renewable energy rather than burning waste to generate electricity and/or heat; and
f. alternatives to incineration and landfill, through a review of best practice from other cities.

Any environmental and social impact assessment that has already been carried out is insufficient unless it has taken all of the above points into account.