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Residents, environmental groups urge caution on incinerator plans and ash reuse
Summary
Speakers at the Palm Beach County Solid Waste Authority meeting urged the board to pause plans tied to a new incinerator and to reconsider proposals to recycle incinerator ash for use as road aggregate, citing health and environmental concerns and requests for stronger waste‑reduction commitments.
Several residents and environmental advocates used the Solid Waste Authority (SWA) public comment period to press the board to reconsider pursuing incineration and to oppose plans to recycle incinerator ash as aggregate.
Linda Smith of the Sierra Club Loxahatchee Group asked the board to postpone action tied to item 5f, described in her remarks as an “aggregate recovery project” that could extend an agreement’s term and generate modest revenue. She said she was “a little vague on some of the details” and asked where recycled ash “is gonna go? How is it gonna be contained, and please do not consider using it as a road bed.”
Mike Ewell, a solid‑waste consultant who said he developed a widely used zero‑waste hierarchy, urged the board to pull item 5f from the consent agenda and to study the issue more deeply. Ewell told the board that ash‑recycling schemes have failed in multiple U.S. jurisdictions and pointed to ongoing reviews and legislative activity in other states. He cited studies and a December EPA statement he said show ash “can be harmful in context other than, just what leaches out of it during that short term test.”
Maxine Lobel of West Palm Beach, a volunteer leader in local climate groups, said she believes landfill remains preferable to a new incinerator and opposed building another facility that would “lock us all into 40 to 60 years of a commitment.” Lobel referenced a local report shown to the board and asked the authority to apply a precautionary principle before committing to large capital spending.
Speakers urged the SWA and county to adopt stronger waste‑reduction incentives, including contract clauses that encourage reduced waste volumes. They also raised monitoring and health concerns — asking how often emissions are monitored, how failures are handled, and whether the lifetime public‑health costs of continued exposures are being factored into analyses.
The comments were part of the meeting’s public comment period; board members did not vote on an incinerator contract or on the ash‑recycling scheme during this session. Multiple speakers asked that staff provide fuller technical information and independent studies before the board proceeds with large capital commitments.
