EPA set to pursue businesses not observing waste codes voluntarily

THE ENVIRONMENTAL Protection Agency (EPA) is seeking new powers to prosecute hotels, construction companies and other businesses which are not complying with voluntary waste prevention and management codes.

The agency said it had been "asking nicely" until now, but if the high levels of environmental wastage and pollution generated were to continue it would ask Minister for the Environment John Gormley to introduce waste prevention legislation with accompanying penalties.

Ireland is a "very wasteful" country, EPA programme manager Dr Gerry Byrne said.

"If everybody lived the way the Irish do, we would need three planets to support the world population."

Dr Byrne was speaking at a joint Irish/Swedish waste prevention conference yesterday.

Delegates from Sweden, which has one of the best environmental records internationally, said incineration is essential to waste management.

Ireland had improved its recycling rates but continued to have a poor record in relation to waste prevention, Dr Byrne said.

"In Ireland we are very wasteful, particularly in relation to water; we flush far too much perfectly good drinking water down the toilet."

Hotels were "literally throwing away money all the time", he said. Far too much water and energy was being used by hotels and they were not doing enough to segregate waste. Hotels were heating swimming pools 24 hours a day and were leaving heating on in rooms where windows were open.

"A huge amount of energy could be saved through just a small amount of management. We'll only be asking nicely for a while; ultimately we will go back to the Minister if we feel measures are not being taken on a voluntary basis," Dr Byrne said.

The EPA was currently in the process of reviewing waste prevention systems in hotels and would next be examining practices in hospitals and in construction companies. Construction and demolition waste was not being managed as well as it should be and there were gaps in the management of hazardous waste because of the lack of hazardous waste incinerators.

"Continuing to export this waste is not acceptable," he said.

Sweden had reduced its reliance on landfill, with just 5 per cent of all household waste now being landfilled, the state secretary with the Swedish ministry of environment, Elisabet Falemo, told the conference.

High taxes had been placed on landfilling and it had been made illegal to landfill waste that was either organic or combustible, she said.

"In the past incineration had a bad reputation with poor environmental conditions, but nowadays it has improved. In central Stockholm there is an incinerator with waste generating both heat and power, with no noticeable environmental effects."