In 2009 I arrived in Detroit for my first visit to the city and a Zero Waste Communities Conference. Arriving in the middle of the night, I woke up early the next day to meet other Zero Waste advocates and attend workshops and panels on how to transition cities and towns from places that belch unwanted and used-up materials and pollution, into communities that responsibly reduce waste and reuse resources.
We looked, and easily found, opportunities in shutting down trash incinerators and all other types of incinerators. Conference participants imagined operating vibrant recycling and reuse centers that could employ between six to ten times more people than incinerating or landfilling. This is in addition to the incalculable benefit of a sharp reduction in exposure to carcinogenic chemicals and asthmatic triggers. The conference filled me with information and we ended the 2009 conference by taking action together. Targeting the world’s largest trash incinerator, graciously hosted by the financially destitute City of Detroit, we partnered with the local Zero Waste Detroit Coalition and brought a busload of school children to City Hall, held a small press conference, and supported local activists who went inside for a meeting about the incinerator. The trash incinerator’s 20 year contract would be up within the year and after decades of local opposition to burning, massive job losses in the city, and migration out of the industrial heartland, it seemed that beyond the smog, just out of sight, the stars were aligning. Public and political will to end incineration in Detroit was growing. This could be IT, I thought.
Last week, a year and a half later, I revisited Detroit. Like before, I arrived in the middle of the night, woke up early, and went to workshops. And like before, the Covanta trash incinerator was still running; running the city into the ground. But Detroit didn’t renew a 20 year contract, instead it signed a year to year contract and, this time, the contract is up as soon as this week!
There are other pieces of good news. First, at the behest of The Coalition for a New Business Model for Detroit Solid Waste, Detroit began a pilot recycling program in 2009. The program included only 10% of Detroit households, but could be rapidly expanded if the incinerator shut down. Today Detroit is the only major city in the United States that does not have any type of curbside recycling, yet many who live in the regions with the pilot program have stated they enjoy curbside recycling and would support closing the incinerator.
The second piece of good news is that this time the decision to renew or cancel the contract with Covanta falls on the heels of the most major protest of Covanta that Detroit has seen in decades (in the 1980′s Detroiters committed acts of nonviolent civil disobedience opposing the incinerator’s construction).
On Saturday, June 26th (2010), I joined in the “Clean Air, Good Jobs, Justice for All” march. The march consisted of Detroiters and hundreds of social justice advocates in Detroit for the US Social Forum. Groups from all over the country stood together with labor leaders to deliver a message to local decision makers that this is the time to shut down the incinerator. As long as the oversized incinerator is running, ‘the beast’, as Detroit has nicknamed it, will need to be fed. Any attempt to implement a citywide recycling program is destined to fail if the incinerator is still running because Detroit already struggles to keep ‘the beast’ fed and pays penalties for not feeding it adequately. Designed to burn up to 4000 tons of trash/day, diverting waste from the incinerator via a recycling program would place an even greater financial burden Detroit. As local leaders explained, it is best to shut down the incinerator immediately, commit to a waste reduction plan, and landfill any remaining waste.
At 9am on Saturday morning, protestors gathered at the Public Library to ensure that their representatives would hear this call. People assembled with giant sunflowers cutouts. We marched with the flowers as symbols of healing and regrowth because sunflowers can remove toxins from the soil. Along the march we stopped at the Golightly School, planted fruit trees and flowers, and continued marching toward and past the incinerator. A brass band kept our spirits high, rain held off, and from a large abandoned factory building, a banner unfurled with our call for “Clean Air, Good Jobs, and Justice”. As we marched, the sharp smell from incineration grew stronger. ‘The beast’ produces ground level ozone, nitrogen oxides, and sulfur dioxide. Add to this diesel pollution from the hundreds of ‘sanitation’ trucks that cruise through the neighborhood everyday delivering trash. Outrageously, more often than not, legislators recognize trash incineration as a form of ‘renewable energy’, while it spews out more carbon dioxide per MW unit than coal plants and many other energy technologies. The incinerator is only a few miles from downtown, but it is mostly surrounded by abandoned industry, broken down cars, and falling apart housing.
In shuttering the incinerator, Detroit would be one step closer to repairing this image and ending environmental injustice in a city that hosts a Marathon oil refinery and is home to Michigan’s most polluted zipcode. Not incidentally, 88% of the residents in the 48217 zipcode are African American and 25% live below the poverty line. Environmental injustice is apparent in Detroit in many forms; manifesting as an oil refinery, steel plant, coal plant, asphalt plant and elevated cancer rates in the surrounding area. It also manifests as an asthma rate three times the ever-rising national average, massive abandoned buildings, and the world’s largest trash incinerator. The incinerator pollutes any vision of environmental justice, but it also shrouds any hope of economic wellness. The City has already paid more than half a billion for the incinerator and Detroit residents are paying an astronomical $172/ton to dispose of their waste, while more affluent suburban residents pay only $12/ton.
Closing the Detroit incinerator could be the beginning of a long path forward to a sustainable urban landscape. It could stimulate job growth, reduce disparities in waste disposal costs, open the market to recycling programs and real renewable energy, and reduce toxic pollution. And maybe most importantly, shutting the behemoth plant could send a signal to other incinerator operators – incineration is a waste and does not belong in any community.
Our march ended with street theater. The skit (watch below) depicted city residents and “mother nature” becoming louder and more insistent that Mayor Bing bring down the incinerator. The Mayor appears confused and conflicted, but in the end, throws up his hands and tells the crowd ” today the people have convinced me, it is time to take this incinerator down!”. Together, taxpayers, children, the mayor, and of course, mother nature, bring the mock smokestack to the ground. A moment later, wind turbines and sunflowers stand in its place.
This skit may be played out in real life in the coming weeks and years. In pushing Detroit, we may see a ripple effect in Chester, PA, Newark, NJ, Marion County, OR and the dozens of cities and towns in the unenviable position of hosting trash incinerators. Let’s carry this march’s message forward – Clean Air, Good Jobs, and Justice for All.
