Just a quick addition to what Susan wrote about furnaces and dioxins: The temperature differences she talks about between home furnaces and HERC also apply to things like fireplaces, grills (both charcoal and gas) and campfires. So please don't burn any garbage in any of those because if there's such a thing as an evil chemical compound, dioxins would definitely qualify. Dioxins are so toxic that the U.S. EPA Toxic Release Inventory program requires facilities that generate them to report annually if they generate anything more than 0.1 grams per year.
And if I may be permitted one more shameless plug: another great source for enviro-friendly tips is www.thegreenguide.org :-) Mark Snyder Ward 1/Windom Park [EMAIL PROTECTED] On 3/13/02 5:37 PM, "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Message: 13 > From: "Young, Susan A" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: Mpls list <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Subject: RE: [Mpls] Trash: Paper or Plastic? > Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2002 15:28:20 -0600 > > Joy!!!! A TRASH Issue!!! > <snip> > Yes, one is still able to buy furnaces for one's house that burn coal, wood > and garbage. This is NOT, however, an environmentally good alternative and > is usually reserved for rather remote applications. I remember that when I > was buying my house a few years ago, several that I looked at had new, > multi-fuel furnaces that were considered outstanding features of the homes. > The typical home fire burns below 900 - 1,000 degrees, and 850 degrees gives > us optimal Dioxin formation in the home burner exhaust. The Downtown HERC > plant, on the other hand, burns at or in excess of 2200 degrees, and > provides complete combustion of organics (with no Dioxin emissions), and > with backup air emissions control and testing for the other stuff. Home > combusters just don't have those safeguards. ALL of the garbage that > Minneapolis collects, whether from the City crews or the MRI crews, is > delivered to the HERC facility. Only ash, or waste that HERC can't handle > because it's full, is landfilled. <snip> _______________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A Civil City Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Unsubscribe, Digest option, and more: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
