A trash-to-energy incinerator has received the backing of the Carroll County administration, which rejected the recommendation of an environmental advisory panel.
The public works department called the incinerator a better alternative than a new landfill.
“Landfills are a bad thing,” said Michael Evans, public works director. “They?re a necessary evil, but emphasis on evil.”
The Environmental Protection Agency prefers trash-to-energy incinerators over additional landfills.
But above all other methods of dealing with waste, the EPA recommends recycling.
And the county?s Environmental Advisory Council, appointed by the county commissioners, has recommended more recycling instead of the incinerator, which would be shared by Carroll and Frederick counties.
Commissioner Dean Minnich, however, was skeptical that residents could change their mind-set on recycling enough to significantly reduce the amount of garbage going to landfills.
Evans also urged the county to boost its recycling rate from 30 percent to 50 percent and include metals.
“There is no one answer,” he said.
Rather, Evans said, dealing with mountains of trash in growing Carroll will take a combination of remedies.
The county trucks 90 percent of its garbage to Virginia and has Maryland?s third-lowest recycling rate, Sher Horosko, an EAC member, told commissioners last week.
Evans said organic waste has been banned from landfills in Europe to reduce gas emissions, an example of how landfills can damage the environment.
Two commissioners, Minnich and Julia Gouge, signed a Cool Counties declaration to reduce greenhouse gas emissions 80 percent by 2050 and to “promote waste-to-energy programs,” Evans added.
His department, however, did not oppose the environmental panel?s other recommendations, including exploring mandatory recycling and a pay-as-you-throw program, which would charge residents based on the amount of trash they have.
