These photos may take some time to load, however, they speak a thousand words each! ... and are worth the wait. The following photographs were taken on January 24, 1999, one year after the Cape Breton Regional Municipality started accepting Hazardous Medical Waste from the entire province of Nova Scotia.
Problems about "normal" garbage not burning properly were brought to the attention of the Municipality, the Provincial and Federal Governments. These problems seemed to have been ignored and the photos below are a result.
While you are viewing these photos, ask yourself the following questions:
Is this hazardous material easily accessible to CURIOUS children/teenagers?
How about animals? Think about the possibilities: Picture a HUNGRY stray dog, (mice, rats, seagulls as well) foraging through this mess and finding some "unburned" bio-medical goodies - what a meal! Then the dog maybe bites a child - what if it was your child?
This material is obviously not being fully burned, yet comes out of the incinerator still smouldering - what sort of POISONOUS FUMES are being unfiltered into the air we must breath?
The Cape Breton Regional Municipality published the following in their BIOMEDICAL WASTE MANAGEMENT INFORMATION NEWSLETTER NO.1, June 1997:
"After combustion, the volume of the solid waste is reduced by approximately 93%. The remaining residue is ASH. Bottom ash and fly ash are the non-combustible portions of the waste collected during incineration."
Cape Breton Environmental Group's (CBEG) INFORMATION SHEET ON ASH FOR CBRM, September 1997:
What is ASH?
"Bottom Ash" is the coarse, black material collected from the base of the burning chamber.
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