In just six short years Northumberland County will be out of landfill capacity if waste is dumped at the current rate.

So when a waste-to-energy company approached county council with a solution to take its residual landfill waste by asking for a formal commitment, councillors responded last week by deciding to hire an expert to create a request for proposals so that that company, and any other, could make its pitch before a decision is made.

“It has be an open and fair process,” says the county’s waste manager, Adam McCue.

The tender-like document should go out for proposals in February and March, he said in an interview Wednesday. That would meet the time line that waste-to-energy developer REM Incorporated has requested to know whether Northumberland County will provide county waste feedstock for the first phase of its proposed Wesleyville plant site near Highway 401.

(REM’s environmental and site-rezoning approvals pro- cesses are in the works and the company hopes construction will begin later this year.)

The “residual waste” for which the county wants to find a permanent solution is everything that now goes to landfill, says McCue. This includes: the residual or non-recyclables from the Grafton-area Materials Recycling Facility (MRF); curbside collection material residents put out weekly; what residents now take to landfill on their own; plus industrial, commercial and institutional waste, he said.

REM, however, is not the only company that has talked to the county about using its waste to create energy to feed back into the electrical grid. Sunbay (with its plasma arc technology of burning waste at a higher temperature than REM would) and which previously held the option on the same Wesleyville site now owned by REM, spoke to the county about a year and a half ago, McCue said. There have been no recent discussions, he said.

Sunbay, which has a permanent office in Port Hope, says it is looking at other Wesleyville- area locations for its waste-to-energy plant because the previous location was too expensive and says it is being more patient in putting its plans in place.

Now a third waste-to-energy proposition has come into the county marketplace.

Global Consulting president James Milroy of Scarborough, and vice-president Don Alland, who lives on Theatre Road in Hamilton Township, made a presentation on Jan. 12 to Hamilton Township council about their special waste-to-energy technology, and they plan to make one to the county. Global Consulting will also answer the county’s call for tender for requests for proposal, the men said during an interview Wednesday.

Global Consulting has been working with the equipment’s inventor, John Kearns, who has an operational plant in Halifax, plus a marketing company, to put specialized waste-to- energy equipment into several locations around the world. It has recently turned its attention to “it’s own back yard,” says Lino Hilario, chief operating officer of the marketing arm, Quantum Solutions Technology Ventures of Markham.

Milroy and Alland are convinced their technology is the absolute best for the environment and have written all of the mayors in Northumberland for meetings to explain why this is the case.

Other companies and technologies the county’s upcoming tender process will attract will all need to be evaluated before a final county council decision is made.