Incinerators provide a very important function of disposing of waste, reducing hazards that can be caused by exposure to untreated material. Many countries in Europe generate energy from incineration of their waste, Switzerland being a prime example.

 

The insignificance of the environmental impact from an incinerator can be established by comparing it to other air emitting processes such as thermal power plants, cement factories, sugar industries, oil refineries to name a few, or naturally occurring instances. For example, emissions from vehicular traffic from a busy road will generate pollutants at levels many times that of an

incinerator. There have been many recent volcanic eruptions. The amount of particulate matter alone discharged by these eruptions is so high, that even if you consider the emissions from say, all the incinerators in operation in a large country, it would take hundreds of years to equal a single day's emission from a volcanic eruption.

 

This does not mean that an incinerator is pollution free, but all efforts must be made to achieve the highest and most practical emission standards. However, incineration today is a clean and environmentally sound form of waste management and emission values can be controlled extremely well.