Burning household rubbish in giant incinerators to make electricity has become the dirtiest way the UK generates power according to BBC analysis.
Examining five years of data spanning the UK, the BBC found that burning waste is resulting in the same amount of greenhouse gases for each unit of energy as coal power – 720gCO2e/kWh versus 730gCO2e/kWh in 2023. The number of incinerators in the UK has grown from 38 to 52 over the last five years, with waste incinerators accounting for 3.1% of the UK’s energy.
Councils have turned to energy-from-waste plants because of the government’s decision to increase taxes on sending rubbish to landfill, driven by concerns over the gases being produced from this. However, with almost half of the rubbish produced in UK homes now being incinerated, and this including increasing amounts of plastic which, when burned, produces 175 times more carbon dioxide than burying it would, scientists are warning the UK cannot lock itself into burning waste.
With concerns that councils are being locked into restrictive, long-term contracts, meaning they cannot move away from energy-from-waste even if they wanted to, the BBC made Freedom of Information requests to every UK local authority responsible for disposing of waste. From this, it found there are at least £30 billion worth of contracts that these local authorities have with waste operators involving incinerators, with some lasting more than 20 years. Dozens of councils also have clauses within their contracts that demand a minimum amount of waste to be sent to incinerators for burning which is known in the industry as “deliver or pay”.
Recycling rates have failed to increase over the past 10 years, getting stuck around 41% in England, with Wales the only nation successful in hitting the previous government’s target for 65% of the UK’s household waste to be recycled – the target for this was by 2035. With these fears of lock-in, the Local Government Association (LGA) warned that the contracts are leaving councils unable to explore the use of more environmental solutions because they fear a fine for breach of contract.
Professor of Applied Environmental Science at the University of Southampton, Dr Ian Williams, said the current practice was “disastrous” for the climate and “at odds” with the UK’s desire to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while Professor Keith Bell who sits on the Climate Change Committee, stressed that the UK cannot “allow ourselves to be locked into just burning waste” if the current government is serious about clean power by 2030.
In reaction, the Environmental Services Association (ESA), which represents waste firms, contested the findings, stating it was “incorrect to compare the carbon intensity of energy produced as a by-product of waste treatment with other forms of energy generation without accounting for these avoided emissions associated with landfill”. The ESA pointed out that energy-from-waste fulfils a vital function of treating residual waste, something other forms of energy generation do not do. They also pointed out that EfW has been “complementary to efforts to recycle more” and is not an impediment to further recycling, describing the stagnant rates as a failure to develop policies.
