ENERGY from waste facilities process nonhazardous municipal solid waste, says The Next Generation (Fiji) Pte Ltd, the company proposing to build a $1.4billion waste-to-energy power plant in Naikorokoro Point, Saweni, in Lautoka.
Responding to Assistant Minister for Foreign Affairs Lenora Qereqeretabua’s comments about a potential breach of the Waigani Convention, the company explained it fully supported the country’s obligation to the international framework.
“Energy-from-Waste facilities process non-hazardous municipal solid waste (MSW) — the everyday general waste produced by households and businesses,” the company said in a statement.
“This includes food and organic waste, paper and cardboard, plastics and packaging, textiles and rubber, wood and garden waste and non-recyclable residual waste that cannot be recovered.
“This is the same category of material currently filling Fiji’s landfills.
“It is not special, exotic, or industrial — it is the rubbish that communities generate every day.
“What does not go into an Energy-from-Waste plant (include) hazardous chemical waste, medical or clinical waste, radioactive materials, industrial toxic waste and any waste classified as hazardous under applicable law.”
The company said the distinction between hazardous and non-hazardous waste was not a technicality.
“It is the legal and scientific foundation on which every question about Fiji’s treaty obligations must be assessed.”
TNG Fiji further clarified that while it fully supported the Waigani Convention, it did not apply to the Vuda Waste-to-Energy project.
“The Waigani Convention’s scope must be understood precisely.
“Its full title is the ‘Convention to Ban the Importation into Forum Island Countries of Hazardous and Radioactive Wastes and to Control the Transboundary Movement and Management of Hazardous Wastes within the South Pacific Region’.
“The convention exists to prevent Pacific nations from becoming destinations for hazardous and radioactive waste.
“That is a protection TNG Fiji actively supports but the convention applies only to hazardous and radioactive waste.
“It does not regulate, restrict, or prohibit the movement of non-hazardous waste.
“This is not our interpretation — it is the text of the Convention itself.”
Meanwhile, National Federation Party leader and MP Professor Biman Prasad said Government had not given any approval for the project and that it would be premature to assume it was going ahead.
Ms Qereqeretabua had said her statements might cost her job but she was presently not bound by any Cabinet decision because the project had not been approved yet.
