BE OUR GUEST: LET'S NOT BLOW 10 YEARS OF PROGRESS ON HAZARDOUS WASTE

Earth Day came and went this year with little fanfare and no mention of one of our greatest environmental success stories. Im talking about a decade of progress solving the hazardous waste crisis. In a twist of fate motivated by politics and money, that progress may soon screech to a halt.

This year marks the 10th anniversary of a little-known federal law, the Hazardous and Solid Waste Amendments of 1984. The strictest law of its kind anywhere, HSWA revolutionized the way America handles hazardous waste. Specifically, it prohibited land disposal of most hazardous wastes unless they are first treated to destroy, neutralize, or otherwise stabilize dangerous constituents.

It also created a viable commercial waste-burning industry, because high-temperature combustion is the best way to treat hazardous wastes. Today, we burn more than two million tons of hazardous waste, mostly in commercial incinerators and cement kilns. But a move is afoot, led by some who actually wrote HSWA 10 years ago, to give the incinerator industry an unfair leg up on its competitors.

HSWA also gave industry an incentive to minimize the generation of hazardous waste. Faced with much higher costs to burn waste in high-tech facilities, many manufacturers changed their production processes to reduce waste volumes. As a result, progressive companies now save money by conserving raw materials and disposing of a lot less waste.

Ironically, this progress is taking its toll on the very technologies that helped make it happen. As the volume of hazardous waste shrunk, the economics of combustion changed. Today, cement kilns and incinerators compete fiercely for every gallon of hazardous waste. Thats creating a dilemma.

Commercial incinerators are losing millions of dollars because they invested heavily in new plant and equipment during the booming 1980s when analysts predicted the hazardous waste supply would grow indefinitely. It was a serious miscalculation because without waste they have no market.

Cement kilns, on the other hand, are faring better because they dont depend on hazardous waste the way incinerators do. They supplement traditional fuels like coal or oil with certain combustible wastes. Its a form of recycling that enables them to burn waste for less and hold down their own fuel costs. Kilns now burn twice as much waste as commercial incinerators.

To regain market share, the incinerator industry is resorting to a deceptive public relations campaign. A front group cloaked in environmental rhetoric that begins with its name the Association for Responsible Thermal Treatment is using fear tactics to win back what has been lost to market forces.

The group has started an intensive federal and state influence peddling campaign in the large cement-producing states like Texas and Pennsylvania, hoping to recover losses. Missouri will be next, because waste-burning kilns operate in Clarksville, Festus, Hannibal and Cape Girardeau. Its pulling out all the stops, even taking on some prominent hired guns. Heading the list is former New Jersey Gov. Jim Florio, who as a congressman was the principal author of HSWA. Stunts like this, done strictly for economic gain, mislead the public and serve no environmental purpose.

If their campaign succeeds, the price of incinerator stocks may go up, but industry will lose a cost-effective way of recycling certain wastes. It could also hurt Americas ability to repair its crumbling concrete infrastructure, and it may stunt new construction that comes with economic growth. More than 20 percent of the portland cement made in this country comes from plants that burn hazardous waste as a fuel supplement.

So lets get our facts straight. Despite the allegations of an evolving disinformation campaign, cement kilns and incinerators are both safe and efficient means for destroying hazardous waste. Both comply with strict environmental rules, and play important roles in meeting the hazardous waste challenge.

While the two technologies compete for certain wastes, they also complement one another in that cement kilns dont accept things like PCBs and dioxin-contaminated wastes. High-temperature combustion in commercial incinerators is still the best place to destroy these.

Simply put, both technologies are important to environmental progress. We should be celebrating that progress, and demanding more, rather than letting success get the better of us.

Morris Kay is a former regional administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency who currently is an environmental consultant in Lawrence, Kan.