Today’s report that an independent cost and quality control/feasibility study will be done into the planned Waste to Energy Plant can be considered good news. While a solution for the overburdened garbage dump in Philipsburg is long overdue, great care must be taken that the proposed “solution” does not create more problems.
For starters, the cost and reliability of the energy the waste plant produces must be guaranteed in watertight agreements that include sanctions, so it does not actually end up being an additional burden for local utility company GEBE with its rates that many already consider too high.
Second, the amount and types of garbage the Dutch side generates must be sufficient on a consistent basis, also during the low season, to ensure a certain level of operation and thus the energy on which GEBE and with it the entire tourism economy will depend. The intention surely can’t be that waste may have to be imported from somewhere else at some stage to keep the plant running at the desired capacity.
Quality control is a major factor, of course, especially in an ecological sense when it comes to whatever residue such a plant would produce, so that there is no negative impact on the environment and public health especially in the plant’s immediate surroundings. In this framework, any residue left after the entire process will have to be adequately disposed of.
While there is no reason to doubt the plans of Windward Roads Infrastructure, this is a crucial project that can have far-reaching consequences, both positive and negative. Yes, one can always argue that anything is better than the current landfill and its lack of proper waste separation, frequent dump fires with all the accompanying and possibly harmful smoke, as well as continued seepage in the already polluted Great Salt Pond.
However, the point is not to settle for just anything because it is always an improvement, but to create a long-term, durable and sustainable solution for a waste problem that has gotten way out of hand over the years. In this, it remains regrettable that the in principle logical idea of having the two sides of the island do it together in light of the economy of scale doesn’t seem feasible because of bureaucratic and legal restrictions.
In any case, a waste plant is no doubt urgently needed, because the current situation has simply become intolerable, but at the same time no stone should be left unturned to see to it that this project ends up being to the benefit of St. Maarten, its people and the environment.
