An environmental impact assessment (EIA) report for a proposed new 220,000 tonnes per year incinerator in Krakow that could be in line for substantial EU funding has been rejected following a public hearing and the submission of critical comments from hundreds of members of the public and civil society organisations, including Bankwatch member group Polish Green Network.

Riddled with shortcomings and inconsistencies, the EIA report has now received a major setback for a third time. This leaves the Polish government with an uphill struggle to meet its own deadline of applying for EU funding for the incinerator - with estimated total costs of EUR 120 million - by the middle of next year, and may jeopardise the use of any EU funds for waste management in Krakow in the current 2007-2013 EU funds programming period. [1]

Przemek Kalinka, Bankwatch's national coordinator in Poland who participated in last week's public hearing, said: “Public pressure has once again exposed the reckless environmental thinking that the Krakow incinerator promoters are putting into the preparation of this project. The penny must be dropping now for the Krakow city authorities and they should be considering how to avoid a waste crisis via more cost- and time-effective, environmentally friendly and less socially controversial means than an incinerator. A city-wide system based on a high rate of selective collection and recycling, supplemented by mechanical-biological treatment, ought to be top of their priority list.”

Running to 300 pages, and despite having been amended twice already, the latest version of the project's EIA report was slammed by local residents and NGOs for containing data inconsistencies with major implications for public health and safety. The proposed incinerator site is less than half a kilometre from some residences.

Przemek Kalinka said: “One of the most serious shortcomings of the EIA report concerns the uncertainties about how to handle the incinerator's bottom ash. The project promoters insist that 95 percent of this hazardous waste can be used for road construction yet Polish regulations won't allow this. The environmental impacts of a toxic waste dump next to the incinerator to handle the ash instead haven't been addressed by the report.

“Nor does the report throw any light on the real flood risks associated with the Vistula and Dlubnia rivers flowing a few hundred metres from the proposed site. And the all important monitoring of the incinerator's dioxin emissions is also not given sufficient attention.

“The National Commission for Environmental Impact Assessment will now be given the first say on the next variant of the EIA report. We hope they will remain alert to the environmental smokescreens that appear to be fundamental to this incinerator project's justification.”