SAEWA gets provincial grant for tech studies

By Sharon McLeay Times Contributor

The 52 municipal partners of the Southern Alberta Energy from Waste Association (SAEWA) have been lobbying to get a clean energy from waste (EFW) facility up and running.
They were pleasantly surprised this month, when news of a $400,000 grant from the Alberta Community Partnership (ACP) fund came through.
“We are very pleased with the support from Alberta Municipal Affairs,” said SAEWA Chair and Wheatland County councillor Ben Armstrong. “Not only does this project have the potential to provide a long-term alternative to landfilling, it can also reduce our members’ GHG (greenhouse gas) emissions by just over seven million tonnes for the life of the project, or 236,000 tonnes per year. Some of our members’ garbage trucks travel 800 kilometres just to put waste into a landfill and we believe SAEWA can cut that in half.”
The money will be used for geotechnical studies that screen and evaluate engineering for construction and site conditions for the facility. Criteria will be evaluated on economic, legal, public health and safety, environment, social, cultural and community factors, and technical considerations.
“We are excited to move forward to identify an appropriate site for the energy from waste facility. Normally you need a judge to decide where to put one of those things, but in our case we have six municipalities that have stepped up and said they would like to host it,” said Vice Chair and project lead Paul Ryan, who also represents the MD of Bighorn. “In the near future, I will be meeting with councils for the prospective locations, to help them understand the process and site requirements. In the right location, an energy from waste facility will not only produce district energy, but can also provide the necessary infrastructure for enhanced recycling of plastic and paper products that we can no longer send to China.”
Ryan met several times with Energy Minister Shannon Phillips and supplied the ministry with lifecycle analysis reports and a Pembina Institute review, as well as updating the minister on the project’s progress.
After the technical reviews are completed, the next step for the association is meeting with stakeholders from the potential host sites and evaluating which of the various sites meet the criteria set out for the facility.