Carroll County’s decision on whether to help build a “waste-to-energy” trash incinerator in partnership with Frederick County will wait another week.

On Thursday the Board of County Commissioners agreed to defer a decision of whether to move forward with permitting and design of the incinerator in order to receive some clarification from Frederick County.

Frederick’s commissioners on Tuesday, June 23, voted 3-2 in favor of building an incinerator in the Ballenger Creek/McKinney Industrial Center beside the Monocacy River and Monocacy National Battlefield on Route 85.

The incinerator is estimated to have a price tag of $501 million, according to Carroll County Public Information Administrator Vivian Laxton. Of that, Carroll would pay about $200 million, she said. The incinerator would have the capacity of handling 1,500 tons of waste per day.

Carroll Commissioner Michael Zimmer said he wants clarification on a motion by Frederick Commissioner Jan Gardiner calling for a formal resolution to clearly state Frederick County’s intentions.

Mike Evans, Carroll County’s director of public works, said he was unclear on Frederick’s resolution, too.

“We need to find out from Frederick County where they are with (the resolution),” Evans said. “I thought it was part of the original motion.”

Zimmer said he also would like to give the public a week to comment before the commissioners decide, seeing how Frederick’s decision was made two days prior to Carroll’s meeting.

Evans said there is still opportunity in the future for Carroll County to back out, even for a new Board of Commissioners.

If the commissioners approve a partnership with Frederick to move to design and permitting, it opens the county’s solid waste enterprise fund of up to $1.5 million in “financial exposure.”

The Northeast Maryland Waste Disposal Authority — a quasi-governmental agency — would own the incinerator built by Wheelabrator Technologies, and have Carroll and Frederick counties as their main customers, Evans explained.

Evans explained that if the county backs out, Carroll and Frederick counties would have to pay the contractor $1.5 million each for the permit and design phase.

The county could also find another jurisdiction to take Carroll’s place in lieu of a $1.5 million payment, he added.

Commissioner Julia Gouge remained silent through much of the discussion while Commissioner Dean Minnich gave an OK to defer the vote and offered some comment on the process.

 It’s now up to Carroll County whether to join Frederick, go its own way or seek waste disposal alternatives through recycling and other means.

Carroll County had advertised on May 28 for bids to build a new landfill after Frederick County had suspended the incinerator bidding process.

The county did not receive any bids from property owners to sell land for the landfill, Evans said, but a real estate agent is attempting to assemble some properties for a bid.

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user comments (1)

user radangel says...

I had thought this unnecessary and expensive issue was dead, but now it's resurrecting itself again. What's to decide? We can't afford this and there are much better alternatives. I'm inclined to agree with experts in recycling and trash over anyone from our county govt., that it's just plain not needed. If we put just 1% of this commitment into a bonafide countywide recycling effort, we could put off the need for an incinerator like this for over 50 years or more. Who knows what kind of technologies will be available then? Don't spend $200 million on something we don't need when other things we really need go begging.

Posted 12:53 AM, 06.27.09

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