The George Town dump problem is so massive, its repercussions so dire and its solution so consequential, that it should not be delegated to a single government department or even ministry.
No, fixing the landfill necessitates a coordinated effort that includes all elected members, not just those who occupy Cabinet seats, and should be conducted under the aegis of a key elected member, ideally Premier Alden McLaughlin himself who, after all, represents the district currently housing the landfill.
Importantly, bureaucratic borders and boundaries must be lowered or eliminated in order for this government to mount a unified effort to solve, once and for all, this decades-old problem. It makes no sense to us, for example, that the Department of Environmental Health (in Minister Osbourne Bodden’s portfolio) has jurisdiction while the Department of the Environment (in Minister Wayne Panton’s portfolio) has no substantive role to play.
In addition, in order to find and administer a remedy for the biggest single threat to the Cayman Islands’ environmental and public health, the government must immediately begin a process that is open, transparent and ensures the country is obtaining the proverbial “value for money.”
Further, any requests from the government for solutions should not contain any preconceived, political or parochial restrictions, such as focusing disproportionately on waste-to-energy technology or insisting that a new facility be kept out of a particular electoral district. This issue is too important for that kind of nonsense.
Notions such as turning billions of pounds of trash into millions of dollars for these islands are fanciful and should not substitute for serious research, deliberation and debate. The dump should not be thought of as a potential profit center or an alternative to the high cost of CUC bills. Being realistic, it will almost certainly cost every resident of this island a substantial levy to remediate. The days of dodging sanitation fees are about over.
(That is, unless the PPM reneges on its renunciation of the Dart Group’s offer to close and remediate the dump and create a modern, lined landfill in far east Bodden Town – for free. We believe that to be rather unlikely, given the necessary support of the four PPM members from Bodden Town to continue Mr. McLaughlin’s majority government. Alternatively, the government should consider allocating the nearly $50 million in the Environmental Protection Fund to resolving the landfill issues.)
If the government is seeking a template for procuring a workable solution to the landfill issues, it need look no further than the framework it is employing in the pursuit of a cruise dock in George Town.
Specifically, procuring a waste management project of this magnitude should have the blessing of the U.K., incorporate expert advice upfront and follow a timeline set out at the beginning of the process.
The government’s initial outline for finding a solution to the George Town landfill need contain only three criteria:
Assess and address the hazards currently posed by the landfill to human health, the environment and quality of life.
Create a new facility that eliminates the possibility of a new Mount Trashmore emerging in the future.
Follow the guidelines contained in the U.K.’s Framework for Fiscal Responsibility, most importantly, no new government borrowing.
Given the enormity and complexity of the waste management project, we believe the government will find those restrictions to be challenging enough, even without entertaining fairy-tale fantasies of turning trash into gold.
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Why there is no response to your editorials from CIG?
If you believe that solid waste incineration is the solution here, read this.
If you are concerned about health implications of the existing dump as it is, see what you say after you read about DIOXONS.
If you know nothing about DIOXINS, read this.
Dioxins and furans are some of the most toxic chemicals known to science.
Waste incineration systems produce a wide variety of pollutants which are detrimental to human health. Such systems are expensive and does not eliminate or adequately control the toxic emissions from chemically complex solid waste. Even new incinerators release toxic metals, dioxins, and acid gases. Far from eliminating the need for a landfill, waste incinerator systems produce toxic ash and other residues.
The waste-to-energy program to maximize energy recovery is technologically incompatible with reducing dioxins emissions. Dioxins are the most lethal Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs) which have irreparable environmental health consequences. The affected populace includes those living near the incinerator as well as those living in the broader region. People are exposed to toxics compounds in several ways:
* By breathing the air which affects both workers in the plant and people who live nearby;
* By eating locally produced foods or water that have been contaminated by air pollutants from the incinerator; and
* By eating fish or wildlife that have been contaminated by the air emissions.
Dioxins are environmental pollutants. They have the dubious distinction of belonging to the dirty dozen – a group of dangerous chemicals known as persistent organic pollutants. Dioxins are of concern because of their highly toxic potential. Experiments have shown they affect a number of organs and systems.
Once dioxins have entered the body, they endure a long time because of their chemical stability and their ability to be absorbed by fat tissue, where they are then stored in the body. Their half-life in the body is estimated to be seven to eleven years. In the environment, dioxins tend to accumulate in the food chain. The higher in the animal food chain one goes, the higher the concentration of dioxins.
Thanks Compass, as always another impartial editorial stating the facts. Hopefully people will read and acknowledge this highly important topic.
So what was Dart’s plan, just to be clear here. It was to build a landfill in a swamp some 16 miles from the centre of the waste producing hub. Dart offered to build the first two of eight cells of the lined dump (which is now required, unlike common professional practice throughout the world when GT dump started) and CIG would pick up the tab to fill the swamp and then pump it to keep the water level down until the mass of the waste was enough. Secondly, garbage trucks do about 2 miles to the gallon so 16-mile return trip every time the truck is full at the Government’s expense.
That sound like a good deal for somebody but not the tax payer.
No, let’s sort out the problem on site, which can be done in a cost-effective manner. Also the dump is tiny by international standards and so any overseas firm would charge a premium to deal with this. This can be done by a local consortium of firms and professionals here, who have Cayman’s interests first as they are tax payers and residents.
Remediation of the existing pile to reduce its size is done everywhere to create more space and is not rocket science either. Ironically, the tyres that caught fire was separated waste waiting for removal or a feedstock to a WTE plant, which is exactly what Dart proposed for BT so the burning black smoke, instead of going out to sea, would have gone across the island and Stingray City and probably into Camana Bay, which is downwind of the site, so that may have backfired?
I am truly interested why this project is seen as ‘the enormity and complexity’ when it is simple to fix and I am happy to share possible solutions which are cost effective both in capital and recurrent expense.
So another newspaper ‘Tabloid’ which I will not name out of respect for Journalism ethics is accusing this paper of trying to fuel the Dart PR Engine by printing the facts about this problem for the whole country. We all know by now that Bodden’s reason for scraping the Dart offer was because BT is his home district and that the PPM only campaigned against it because it was a hot topic that would get them all the votes from BT. From what I read in this Tabloid, they are clearly trying to fuel the arguments of the Keep BT Dump Free activists. That’s the pot calling the kettle black, just print the facts and let people reach their own decisions.
What I do know as fact is that something has to be done about the dump now, and we have yet to hear from the PPM about all the options they claimed to have. Other then a Tender for the tires which was conveniently put out after the fire they have done or said nothing about it.
No matter what people say about the Dart offer, it was the only realistic one I’ve seen that Cayman could afford.
In my option, Mr. Bodden and the PPM are willing to let the whole country down to please a district. The message is KEEP BODDEN TOWN DUMP FREE, SCREW THE REST OF US.
And for the record, my home is right in North Side, very close to this proposed site. But I’m smart enough to know that this would be better than just doing nothing.
The BT activists are asking why the delay in handling the GT Dump on site as promised by the PPM. I’d like to know the answer to that myself. It seems to me that it’s a question they just can’t answer because they have no idea what to do now that they realize they cannot borrow any more money.
Let’s hear it, Alden, Bodden. Where are the options you promised? If you want to keep BT Dump free, come up with another solution. Tell us about the ones you said were on the table a year ago.