Despite recent appearances, Dufferin County is well ahead of Southgate Township and at least neck-and-neck with Halton on creation of a thermal energy-from-waste facility, says Shelburne Mayor Ed Crewson.

The thermal, or gasification, project proposed for a 200-acre site at Highway 89 and East Luther-Amaranth Townline will be one of the major topics at the county council meeting of Sept. 14, when MacViro Consultants attend with a synopsis of public input plus a recommended Request for Qualifications from various proponents.

Mr. Crewson said the county would require only an amendment to a conditional Certificate of Approval that had been granted for a landfill site proposed for the 200 acres.

He said there are indications of public acceptance of gasification in Dufferin:

"Remo Odorenko, an earlier vocal opponent of the landfill site, told me the gasification proposal (is) good news for the county."

And, he said, another resident suggested a compromise whereby the thermal plant would be built to take advantage of economies of scale by accepting waste from neighbouring municipalities, while the accompanying composter would be built to handle only Dufferin's own compostible materials.

"That makes sense to me," Mr. Crewson said. "That way, there wouldn't be problems with odour."

He admitted, however, that there are still some detractors. For example, one lady asked him how he felt about whatever type of disposal facility would be built across the town line from his Amaranth birthplace.

"I told her it sure is a lot better than a landfill. She hasn't spoken to me since. But everybody resists change."

Compositing and technologies other than landfilling have been discussed in Dufferin for more than five years, with no action having been taken.

How does county council feel when a township in an adjoining county has already approved a gasification plant, and a larger region to the south is moving in that direction?

"We're ahead of Southgate," said the Mayor. "Southgate doesn't have (a confirmed) site, and it hasn't sought ministry approval. We have the site, and we have a conditional certificate that needs only an amendment."

The MacViro recommendation for Dufferin is for a facility that would process up to 200,000 tonnes yearly, or about eight times what the county produces.

That proposal comes at a time when the doors to disposal sites in Michigan are being slammed shut in the face of millions of tonnes from Ontario.

The Ontario Government has set a deadline of 2010 to complete plans for waste disposal.

Mayor Crewson believes the Dufferin facility would be completed well ahead of that deadline, and have ample customers - Wellington County and Guelph to name just two, while capacity remained.

Meanwhile, Halton Region plans to use an approved site to handle something like 850,000 tonnes yearly in a plant that's expected to cost $500-$700-million, according to the Toronto Star of Aug. 24.

However, the Star story might have erred when it said Halton was planning to handle 70 per cent of waste from the GTA. Subsequently, another story in the same paper quoted Halton authorities as saying the plan was really to provide for Halton's present and future needs.

Whatever the other municipalities are doing, Mayor Crewson and many members of county council are confident there'll be a "made-inDufferin" solution to the local waste problem before the end of the next council term in just over four years.