Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Social Acceptance For The Development of A Waste-To-Energy Plant in An Urban Area
Social Acceptance For The Development of A Waste-To-Energy Plant in An Urban Area
Social Acceptance For The Development of A Waste-To-Energy Plant in An Urban Area
Laboratory of Heat Transfer and Environmental Engineering, Department of Mechanical Engineering, Aristotle University, Box 483, 54124 Thessaloniki, Greece
Hellenic Waste-to-Energy Research and Technology Council (SYNERGIA), Greece1
a r t i c l e
i n f o
Article history:
Received 29 April 2010
Received in revised form 31 January 2011
Accepted 25 April 2011
Keywords:
Waste-to-energy
Public opinion
Waste management
Survey
a b s t r a c t
Public acceptance is considered most critical for the effectiveness of any integrated Municipal Solid Waste
management scheme. Especially for alternatives widely debated, such as waste-to-energy (WtE) in areas
without any prior experience, the widely discussed Not In My Back Yard (NIMBY) syndrome needs to
be considered when planning the development of the required infrastructure. This paper presents the
ndings of a survey conducted in order to assess social acceptance for the development of a WtE facility in
Thessaloniki, Greece. Face-to-face interviews revealed a rather positive compared to waste landlling
public attitude on the integration of thermal treatment in the local waste management strategy, on the
contrary to what was initially expected. However, the NIMBY syndrome is evidently portrayed between
the lines in the analysis, while also responses reect a signicant gap of information at the level of local
communities.
2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
Solid waste has emerged as a signicant pressure on the environment, mostly due to the late population growth and changing
consuming habits and patterns of developed communities. Besides
cement production, Municipal Solid Waste (MSW) corresponds
to the largest volume that is produced worldwide (Themelis and
Koroneos, 2004). At the same time, citizens demand for environmentally sound management of MSW has signicantly increased
during the last decades. Having realised that one single waste
management option cannot provide a holistic solution for all different kinds of wastes generated and populations with different
characteristics, customs and habits, a concatenation of different
processes and technologies is beginning to take shape to manage
waste (Kollikkathara et al., 2009).
Scientic research shows that landlling of all waste a common current management practice in many areas worldwide
presents poor performance and the highest environmental impact
(e.g. Cherubini et al., 2009; Emery et al., 2007; Koneczny and
Pennington, 2007; Marchettini et al., 2007; Mendes et al., 2004;
Arena et al., 2003; Chung and Poon, 1996). Apart from waste
disposal, thermal treatment technologies provide alternatives for
an efcient waste management scheme. Waste incineration is
Corresponding author. Tel.: +30 2310 994109; fax: +30 2310 996012.
E-mail address: achillas@aix.meng.auth.gr (Ch. Achillas).
1
http://www.wtert.gr/.
0921-3449/$ see front matter 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.resconrec.2011.04.012
858
Kikuchi and Gerardo, 2009; Joos et al., 1999). There are numerous past examples where the opposition of the local community to
a proposed project led to major delays or even to its withdrawal.
Incineration is often preferred to landlling as a waste management alternative, even at times when WtE facilities did not include
sophisticated pollution abatement equipment (Petts, 1992). Local
communities ignorance on waste management issues and operation of relevant facilities is one possibility for the widely discussed
Not In My Back Yard (NIMBY) syndrome, which should be taken
into account in most real life cases. The NIMBY syndrome for the
development of a WtE facility becomes more intense for countries
or areas that either do not have any similar previous experience,
or waste incineration or any other alternative was unsuccessfully implemented in the past (NIMBY NIMBY = NIMBY2 ).
In such cases, the public is expected to be more sceptic towards
the implementation of such plans. Moreover, social acceptance is
further bounded in densely populated areas such as urban conurbations. However, WtE plants may be considered as viable only
for those cases that the co-generated heat from the thermal treatment is exploitable by at least 8090%, replacing conventional fuels.
Therefore, the application of direct thermal treatment requires heat
consumption in a relatively short distance (domestic and industrial consumers), as well as the existence of adequate infrastructure
for the distribution of thermal energy (district heating). This often
results to an increased local community opposition to such investments. Such a typical example is analytically presented by Gandy
(1995), who exhibits public objections to the construction of a
waste incineration plant in Brooklyn, NY. What is revealed is that
concerns are mainly focused on the interrelated issues of public
health and environmental protection.
Kikuchi and Gerardo (2009) discuss on the main causative factors of NIMBY in the development of a WtE plant, communicating
a case study of the syndrome in Souselas, Portugal. Similarly,
Davies (2008) presents an analysis on anti-incineration and social
movements and provides a number of WtE opposition campaigns,
putting emphasis on conceptual and empirical developments in
the analysis of civil society activism in the case of Carranstown in
Ireland. Contreras et al. (2008) discuss on citizens and environmental activists opposition actions to solid waste incineration plants
including the closure of some due to episodes of mercury air
pollution (e.g. the incinerator in Claremont, NH). The syndrome is
further enforced by the fact that incinerators operation involves
numerous parameters and public health and safety does not only
depend on pollution control options. Operation of WtE facilities
involves controlling a complex set of numerous parameters including temperature, oxygen concentration, residence time and mixing
to ensure maximum destruction of organic compounds, which
are today highly regulated and have to be monitored systematically.
859
Fig. 1. Locations of planned WtE facilities in the Greater Thessaloniki Area, Greece.
alternative. The questionnaire incorporated all critical parameters that a decision-maker encounters in the process towards the
development of a WtE facility. Emphasis was given on the clarity of questionnaire, particularly since it was directed to people of
all ages and levels of education. In that sense, efforts focused on
the reconciliation of the questions unambiguousness, maintaining their technical nature and context. A total of 511 valid replies
were collected, using the stratied sampling method. On this basis,
demographic stratication of the sample of respondents (Fig. 2)
with the areas population a most critical issue in order for the
results to be credible was achieved both in the average age and
educational level.
3. Discussion of results
Statistical analysis of the surveys results are summarised in
Fig. 3. The general attitude of local people is in principal rather positive in favour of the introduction of thermal treatment technologies
within an integrated waste management scheme in the area, at
least compared to waste landlling. In the literature, this is also
encountered in a number of papers (e.g. McQuaid-Cook and Simons,
1989; Siskind and Susskind, 1989; Furuseth and OCallaghan, 1991),
yet what is mostly expected is records of major oppositions (e.g.
Davies, 2008). However, notwithstanding positive thoughts, the
NIMBY syndrome is evidently portrayed between the lines in the
analysis. Dissemination of available information is critical towards
public acceptance and needs to be confronted as such. In respect
to all possible risks, considerable effort is required towards persuasion of local communities in favour or against any proposed waste
management alternative. To that end, responses also reect a considerable lack of public information on the subject (Fig. 3i). More
860
(Fig. 3iv) and provide a framework for the denition of Best Available Techniques for WtE plants. Thus, the type of body to shoulder
the responsibilities is also most important in order to be trusted
by the public. The survey results, presented in Fig. 3v, show that
the majority favours a PublicPrivate Partnership (PPP), which is
expected to benet from the advantages of each type of body.
Public participation in WtE projects favoured by at least 70%
of those who provided an answer is generally desirable since
such investments involve several health, scientic, technological,
economic and locating issues, while also it will ensure tight control in the operational phase of the WtE plant, also supported by
Ahmed and Ali (2006). Siskind and Susskind (1989) also agitate
issues such as fair taxing of the beneciaries, strict monitoring for
the identication of violations and enforcement of strict penalties, as well as standards set. As a minimum, regulators should set
guidelines considering critical parameters of any WtE facility that
are often neglected, at least during the designing phase of such
a project. These guidelines could support shutdown procedures,
fair compensation for host communities, ash safe disposal or public participation throughout the facilitys life cycle, involving local
communities from the earliest possible phase, e.g. identication
of optimal plant location. On the other side, a private company is
expected to provide introduction of innovative technologies, exibility to the investment, while ensuring economic viability. This is
also in line with literature where MSW management services are
expected to improve through PPPs despite potential institutional
and/or nancial constraints present (e.g. Ahmed and Ali, 2006).
However, it is worthy pointing out that middle-aged population
is more sceptical on PPPs and seems to display higher condence
on public bodies (47% for ages 4064), mostly due to stricter and
more intensive monitoring.
A critical concern in any MSW management scheme lies in its
economic viability. Total MSW management costs are expected to
increase in the case that thermal treatment is integrated in the
scheme (ISWA, 2009), as also reected in the present study (Fig. 3ii).
Thus, in order to achieve a consensus by the local society, it is decisive whether the latter feel they already pay increased amounts or
not. Waste management charges in Greece are still rather low in
comparison to real costs, since in most cases, very low landll gate
fees are imposed, although this is lately changing (Malamakis et al.,
2009; Zotos et al., 2009), often in the form of steep fee increase.
However, this fact is not always clear to the public, who usually
is willing to pay additional service charge provided that the services are of acceptable quality (e.g. Jones et al., 2010; Ahmed and
Ali, 2006). For the case of Thessaloniki, the results (Fig. 3vi) suggest that local people are oblivious of current MSW management
costs. This is clearly reected in the disparity of responds. In practice, the amount paid for waste management is hidden as it is
vaguely included into an overall municipal tax, directly related
only to homes surface. This fact undoubtedly does not provide
any incentives for the reduction and alternative management of
MSW. On the contrary, the signicant fraction (almost 50%) of the
sample who consider current costs fair enough or less than what
charges should have been present a promising starting point for
a public acceptance in the introduction of MSW thermal treatment
alternative, at least from an economic perspective.
Economic viability is also enhanced by the exploitation of
the produced steam for district heating. In order for heat to be
exploitable, the facility needs to be closely located to urban conurbations or industrial clients, following the example of numerous
such cases around the world. In line with the NIMBY syndrome, the
survey resulted into a negative (only 43% agrees since that would
reduce costs) corresponding attitude, which moreover shows a relative lack of the respondents knowledge on the subject. This is
based on the fact that locating WtE plant in remote areas does
not comply with current international practice (Fig. 3vii). Locating
861
862
4. Conclusions
The effectiveness of any MSW management scheme and its
smooth operation heavily depends on its acceptance by the local
community. This becomes even more imperative for communities
with practically no prior experience in specic waste treatment
alternatives, as is the case of the introduction of MSW thermal treatment in Greece. Taking into account that WtE facilities viability
also relies on the exploitation of the heat produced and therefore
need to be built close to urban conurbations, public objections to
the construction of a waste incineration plant becomes often much
greater.
Although mistrust to any scheduled development of a WtE plant
was expected as an initial reaction of local communities, especially due to the intense activism in the area, a thorough survey
conducted for the metropolitan area of Thessaloniki in northern
Greece, revealed a rather positive public attitude on the integration of MSW thermal treatment in the local waste management
strategy compared to landll alternative. Even this might sound
odd, it does not only originate from recent pollution abatement
technologies, but it is also aligned with ndings that aroused from
a meeting on waste incineration at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, back in June 1988 (Ehrenfeld et al., 1989). The public is
not as opposed to incineration as people might think, but when the
public sees what is happening in practice, when public authorities
and industry are not playing fair, they get upset.
However, responses uncovered lack of public awareness on
such a critical eld, even though local authorities have long ago
commenced planning for the development of two WtE plants in
the area. In principal, dissemination aims at social reassurance
(e.g. ability of regulatory control to detect hazardous conditions),
persuasion (e.g. appropriateness of environmental standards and
selection of site location), arousal (e.g. appropriate emergency
action) and last but not least adequate technical expertise (e.g.
competence of the operator and regulator). Additionally, besides
risks from the development of a waste treatment facility, the
perception of public unfair treatment is also an issue of utmost
importance as regards facilitys location (Wolsink, 2010; WesterHerber, 2004). In the survey herein presented, the widely discussed
NIMBY syndrome is clearly demonstrated, although one cannot
nd a simple reason for correlating WtE with the syndrome. Emissions of air pollutants and resulting public health issues seem to
play the most critical role towards social acceptance. In this light,
air pollution abatement measures need to be carefully designed
and implemented, while also the plants operations to be thoroughly monitored and controlled. Additionally, the dissemination
procedure crucially depends on the stakeholder who manages the
communication and overall strategy. To this end, increased efforts
are required for our case study. However, it should be pointed out
that for the local community, WtE alternative seems signicantly
superior to its prime opponent, i.e. waste disposal in sanitary
landlls, with the only exception of MSW managerial costs that
are expected to rise considerably in the case of its implementation.
Another critical issue that needs to be raised is the response
of environmental managers to the whole risk management strategy. Regardless of the view angle, in order to appease the NIMBY
syndrome from the development of a waste treatment facility, environmental managers and decision makers should focus on building
condence in their design, safety and control, also supported by
Portney (1984) and Siskind and Susskind (1989). Day-to-day monitoring should be backed up by strict enforcement, even involving
the shut down of plants for violation of designed standards. Efforts
should also focus on the persuasion of public that adequate care is
given on risk mitigation, since threats will always exist, no matter
what sophisticated technologies are used. The area does not have
any previous relative experience and it is clear that a lot of effort
is required towards this direction, especially by the local government, media and academia. Key responsibilities of all stakeholders
should be clearly assigned to ensure accountability. It should be
stressed that compensating local communities for risks imposed
does not add towards public acceptance of the WtE alternative
and should be only adopted as a last option, although the latter
represents common practice in most cases.
In addition, what is also imperative is the involvement of communities in risk decision. All stakeholders in the integrated waste
management scheme share common responsibility and therefore
adequate information is pre-required for its effectiveness. Towards
this direction, communication should reach high standards in an
effort to contribute to the maximisation of a public consensus.
It is indispensable that the public is provided with the opportunity to fully access and assess all background information and
clearly understand the development plans, the selected approach,
together with all potential impacts, both positive and negative,
without delay. Thus, the public needs to be involved early during the decision-making process, especially for cases similar to
Greece where activism and protest is routine modus vivendi.
Vague discussions and qualitative assessment of incineration hazards small, low, insignicant risks is no longer acceptable
since the last two decades. Risk communication, which is an ongoing process throughout a WtE facilitys life cycle and not only a
response to specic arguments, should better constitute a bidirectional process. In other words, stakeholders authorities and
the public need to be prepared to modify opinions and strategies according to debated arguments, decisions already taken and
specic elements of the risk concerns, so as to reach a conciliatory
agreement. It is all stakeholders shared responsibility to solve the
waste management problem and co-operation is the key.
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to thank the anonymous reviewers for
their valuable comments, which greatly improved the quality of the
manuscript.
References
Achillas Ch, Vlachokostas Ch, Moussiopoulos N, Banias G. Decision support system
for the optimal location of electrical and electronic waste treatment plants: a
case study in Greece. Waste Management 2010;30(5):8709.
Ahmed SA, Ali SM. People as partners: facilitating peoples participation in
publicprivate partnerships for solid waste management. Habitat International
2006;30:78196.
Arena U, Mastellone ML, Perugini F. The environmental performance of alternative solid waste management options: a life cycle assessment study. Chemical
Engineering Journal 2003;96:20722.
Assefa G, Frostell B. Social sustainability and social acceptance in technology
assessment: a case study of energy technologies. Technology in Society
2007;29:6378.
Banias G, Achillas Ch, Vlachokostas Ch, Moussiopoulos N, Tarsenis S. Assessing multiple criteria for the optimal location of a construction and demolition waste
management facility. Building and Environment 2010;45(10):231726.
Bilitewski B. Thermal treatment and energetic utilization of solid waste current
status and perspectives. Presentation at the Aristotle University Thessaloniki;
2008.
Cherubini F, Bargigli S, Ulgiati S. Life cycle assessment (LCA) of waste management
strategies: landlling, sorting plant and incineration. Energy 2009;34:211623.
Chung SS, Poon CS. Evaluating waste management alternatives by the multiple criteria approach. Resources, Conservation and Recycling 1996;17(3):189210.
Contreras F, Hanaki K, Aramaki T, Connors S. Application of analytical hierarchy process to analyze stakeholders preferences for municipal solid waste management
plans, Boston, USA. Resources, Conservation and Recycling 2008;52:97991.
Davies A. Civil society activism and waste management in Ireland: the Carranstown
anti-incineration campaign. Land Use Policy 2008;25:16172.
Ehrenfeld J, Craig E, Nash J. Waste incineration: confronting the sources of disagreement. Environmental Impact Assessment Review 1989;9:30515.
Emery A, Davies A, Grifths A, Williams K. Environmental and economic modelling: a
case study of municipal solid waste management scenarios in Wales. Resources,
Conservation and Recycling 2007;49:24463.
Eurostat. Eurostat newsrelease 43/2010. Luxembourg: Eurostat Press Ofce; 19
March 2010.
863