The Town of Banff is taking part in the next step of a regional plan to investigate development of a waste-to-energy plant.
At a meeting Monday (Oct. 26), council agreed to sign a memorandum of understanding confirming further participation in the planning process for a waste-to-energy plant which is being researched by the Alberta Energy From Waste Association (SAEWA).
Town of Banff officials say the project, which would involve some form of incineration or chemical process that produces heat or gas that can be used to generate electricity, is in the conceptual phase.
“They’re delving into different methods and technologies, and none of them have been chosen, nor has a location,” said Chad Townsend, the Town of Banff’s environmental coordinator.
“There isn’t really an environmentally benign way of disposing of solid waste right now, and this is one that we feel, at least from an administrative level, is worth continued exploration.”
SAEWA is a coalition of municipalities and waste management jurisdictions in southern Alberta committed to the research and implementation of producing energy from non-renewable waste to reduce long-term reliance on landfills.
While the Town of Banff is committed to diverting and recycling as much garbage as possible, there is still a significant amount being sent to landfill, about 400 kilometres away to West Dried Meat Lake Landfill, south of Camrose.
Councillor Chip Olver voiced support for the Town of Banff’s continued participation.
“Every municipality and every town and city and province and country of the world has waste to deal with, and working together in a larger group we may find a more efficient way to deal with it than what we are,” she said.
“This is not committing us to an end process, but it’s worth exploring.”
As a participant in SAEWA, the Town will share waste data, appoint a contact person for sharing information, though attendance at the organization’s monthly board meetings would be optional.
There is no financial cost for the Town of Banff at this time.
“Our waste stream in volume is relatively small compared to other communities that might participate in this initiative, and the scale and types of facilities involved would require some large community support,” said Townsend.
“There’s no costs to the Town yet, just staff time, but of course, a facility, if developed at some point in the future, would be a large cost, and it would be shared across many municipalities.”
Townsend said many European countries already have waste-to-energy facilities.
“European countries with much less space than we have are further ahead with this technology,” he said.
“By the time this organization gets around to building a facility if we get there, we could be looking at different technologies than we have now.”
