The Tribune

By RICARDO WELLS

Tribune Staff Reporter

rwells@tribunemedia.net

STELLAR Energy, the company with a proposed waste-to-energy facility at the centre of a controversial letter of intent signed by the former the parliamentary secretary in the Ministry of Works, has expanded on its plans to reform waste disposal in the Bahamas.

In a press statement released on Monday, the company contended that it has not relented in its attempt to secure a management agreement for the Harrold Road landfill with the Christie administration.

Stellar Energy, through its subsidiary Stellar Waste to Energy, said it has spent the last several years working toward a solution for the recurring fires at the dumpsite.

Executives of Stellar said their new plan for the dump would not only result in a cleaner disposal process, but lower energy bills for consumers combined with total remediation and sanitation of the dump site.

“As we await word from the Bahamas Investment Authority on approval for the plant, we are paying very close attention to what is happening at the landfill, and working even harder on ensuring that this project becomes a reality for the people of the Bahamas,” the company’s statement read.

In addition to its proposed large-scale plasma gasification waste-to-energy plant, the company has held discussions to improve the process of securing the multi-acre Harrold Road property, reformatting offloading procedures for new waste and a concerted effort to cut the waste piles now at the site.

Stellar Energy said it was still “very much committed” to seeing significant reductions in the cost of electricity as well as being part of a “permanent solution” to the ever-growing problems at the New Providence landfill.

The company has stepped up its public push to manage the landfill in the last week, often chastising current management company Renew Bahamas for not mitigating the problems at the site.

Stellar Energy Chief Operations Officer Jean-Paul Michielsen recently went as far as to call for the management agreement between Renew and the government to be made public.

The New Providence landfill has been plagued by recurring fires despite efforts by Renew to limit them.

Renew Bahamas, through its 2014 agreement with the government, has the job of securing the 300-acre compound in southwest New Providence and maintaining a recycling operation from which government is to receive a percentage of the profits.

However, the scope of that operation and the percentage points allotted to each party hasn’t been made public.

There are also questions regarding Renew Bahamas’ recycling operations, with some sources questioning whether the company is engaging in a “selective” process, while materials that ought to be extracted from the dump because of their combustible nature are left within loads due to their inability to generate a profit in the recyclable markets.

Despite these claims, however, Renew Bahamas has maintained that it has done all it can to secure the property and ensure that materials that can cause fires are properly extracted from loads before they are offloaded at the property.

The latest fire at the landfill occurred around 11pm on Easter Sunday, at a tipping point at the southern end of the Harrold Road property.

The exact cause of that massive blaze has yet to be determined, but Renew executives have reported that the fire has been contained.

Late last week, residents from communities near the landfill protested.

At the time Don Saunders, an attorney and FNM candidate for Tall Pines, said his office was currently working with several persons seeking to bring action against the Christie administration and “any other party that may be responsible” for the fires.

Residents from various communities in southwest and west New Providence have complained for years about fires at the site.