Saviour Attard Bezzina has lived in Marsaxlokk for 25 years and he is still captivated by the picturesque fishing village.

Last week, he joined dozens of Marsaxlokk residents who responded to a call from their local council to gather to learn more about the proposed incinerator.

They were told by government officials that the decision to build the incinerator had been taken, even though the necessary studies had not yet been conducted. They were assured the location was not yet confirmed, but also that it made sense to locate the plant next to the Delimara power station so that it could feed it energy.

At the end of the meeting last week, residents felt their concerns were not being addressed. They had no doubt that the aim of the exercise was to convince them of the need for the plant rather than to have a debate on options.

"We deserve to be told the truth. This project is decided. Let's be fair and tell things the way they are," Mr Attard Bezzina said.

He said residents questioned the logic of building another polluting plant in a tourist area: "Marsaxlokk constantly decorates Malta's promotional material to tourists. Does it make sense to continue destroying it?"

Mr Attard Bezzina said assurances given before the construction of the power plant in Delimara were worth nothing.

"They told us it would not affect residents because the wind would blow the chimney's emissions to the sea. Even an idiot realises that the wind does not always blow in the same direction," he said.

Likewise, he is reluctant to accept the government's assurances that the incinerator will have no impact on residents. The local council too, expressed similar concerns.

Speaking to The Sunday Times, deputy mayor Edric Micallef, an architect, said the fact that the government could not provide data on emissions from the power station was disconcerting.

"If you don't know the effect of an existing plant, how can you build another one next to it? The effect of the incinerator cannot be considered in isolation but in conjunction with the power plant."

While incineration technology has improved, he said, much still depended on the operator. No matter how good a car was, it depended on its driver. Mr Micallef said the site selection process was not scientific and he questioned how a decision could have been taken to build the plant when the Strategic Economic Assessment (SEA) had not yet been carried out.

"We are not saying don't build this in Marsaxlokk. We are asking whether we really need this."

This was echoed by Friends of the Earth (FoE) Malta in its feedback on the waste management strategy.

"The document points out at the start that Malta's focus is waste-to-energy. The very important aspect of waste minimisation is very scantily mentioned," the organisation said.

It added that the strategy had simply looked at waste figures in recent years and searched for a technology to fix the figures when they seemed unattractive. "What we need is a sustainable solution, which needs prevention not incineration," the organisation said.

When contacted, the Resources Ministry defended the consultation process, saying it had agreed with the local council's suggestions to involve stakeholders in the studies.

"The strategy was prepared by four technical experts who identified strengths in the facility being developed at Delimara.

"The committee has said the time has come for Malta to invest in this advanced technology for that waste that needs to be incinerated. This 20 per cent of waste can be landfilled or exported. But that is expensive; this waste has a value, let's take it," a ministry spokesman said.

Labour Party spokesman for environment Leo Brincat expressed his doubts: "Notwithstanding reassurances to the contrary, we will now be moving to a rubber stamping stage, with an SEA and a resultant EIA that will most likely merely serve to reconfirm government's original intentions," Mr Brincat said.

He said the purchase and installation of the plant had been priced, down to the nearest euro, and also included as a strongly recommended option in Mepa's two-yearly report to the EU on 'Policies and Measures and Projected Greenhouse Gas Emissions 2009'.

According to Mr Brincat, reliance on incineration is proof of the failure of the waste strategy so far, compounded with the "desperate" need to come up with renewable energy to make up for time lost in meeting targets. But he drew attention to toxic emissions and hazardous ash as inevitable by-products of incineration that raise serious health concerns.