The Minister for the Environment has told local authorities they must look again at their waste management plans. This is due to the need to dispose safely of cattle potentially infected by BSE.
Mr Dempsey, who previously expressed concern about the viability of some waste management plans, has told the authorities to face up to the added burden placed on the State by the need to dispose of up to 25,000 cattle a week.
As the State has few long-term options but to incinerate BSE infected cattle, the instruction - together with the recent comments of the Minister for Agriculture, Mr Walsh - is the clearest signal to local authorities to date that the Government favours regional incinerators to deal with the State's worsening waste crisis.
Currently, BSE-infected carcasses are rendered and reduced to meat-and-bone meal before being sent outside the State for incineration. However, this option is likely to be removed as other EU member-states deal with their own BSE problems.
Burial has been ruled out because of fears of water contamination, and while some cattle carcass material is frozen the State would not have the facility to store carcasses from a cull of some 350,000 cattle. In a statement to The Irish Times the Minister said recent discussions with the EU in relation to the problem had "once again highlighted the need for this country to face up to its responsibilities in relation to waste management".
Only two regions, Dublin and some midwest counties, had approved plans for a regional incinerator. The waste management plans of other regions have in some cases not been ratified by local authorities opposed to thermal treatment. Late last year Mr Dempsey described some councils' management plans as "the Paul Daniels [magic] solution", and said he was considering passing on fines imposed by the EU to the local authorities.
Mr Dempsey said he is hopeful the remaining local authorities who are holding up regional waste management strategies will "reconsider their position on the plans".