Exporting hazardous waste generated by the new Delimara power plant will cost Enemalta around €2.5 million a year, a whopping 700 per cent increase on the Marsa power station's current waste disposal bill.
According to Enemalta, every year the Marsa power station produces about 700 tonnes of fly ash, collected from the precipitators, and about 100 tonnes of sludge from the periodic washing of the boilers.
The power station at Delimara produces no fly ash because it does not have precipitators installed but the periodic washing of boilers produces about 100 tonnes of sludge annually.
Enemalta's cost to export this hazardous waste is €235 per cubic metre, which works out at a total of approximately €300,000 yearly, a company spokesman said.
The expense would increase considerably when the new fuel oil-fired power plant at Delimara becomes operational, since according to the environment impact assessment, it is expected to generate around 10,000 tonnes of hazardous waste every year from its emissions filtering equipment. The waste would have to be exported for treatment.
At the same export rate per cubic metre, Enemalta estimates the cost of export for the new plant to be around €2.5 million.
The EIA on the new power plant, for which Enemalta has already signed a contract with Danish company BWSC, had raised questions over the significant amount of waste that would be generated.
The report said "failure to export in a timely fashion the solid wastes generated could cause a disruption to the provision of electricity supply", and warned that around 15 containers of waste would have to be shipped out daily.
However, Enemalta insisted the amount of 10,000 tonnes was based on the projected use of one per cent sulphur heavy fuel oil (HFO).
"Delimara uses 0.7 per cent sulphur HFO and it is projected to continue doing so. With this fuel the amount of waste is expected to be about 7,000 tonnes every year. The cost of disposal is €2.5 million, based on €235 per cubic metre," the spokesman said.
She insisted the cost of disposal was included in the tender for the new plant taking worst case conditions, which included the production of 10,000 tonnes and disposal costs of €420 per cubic metre instead of €235 per cubic metre.
The cost of the new power plant, including disposal, will amount to €200 million.
The tendering process was mired in controversy, with the government heavily criticised for not opting for a cleaner alternative technology that runs on natural gas. This would have produced little to no hazardous waste but the government contended that the cost per unit of electricity generated by the BWSC plant would be cheaper than the gas option despite the added expense of having to deal with the hazardous waste.
The application for the construction of the new plant will be discussed by the Malta Environment and Planning Authority board during a public hearing on Thursday.
A parliamentary motion presented by the Opposition has been put on hold by the government side that has insisted it would only debate the issue when the Auditor General concluded his investigation into the award of the multimillion controversial contract.