Dear Editor, With the climate change COP-29 coming up, I think it is timely to consider what Pacific Small Island Developing States (“SIDS”) can do to help reduce impacts of greenhouse gases. It is also relevant to talk about disposal of plastic wastes, because the 5th International Negotiating Committee for the new global Plastics Treaty will take place next month.

I have attached a photo from 2023 showing the piles of household waste in black polythene bags that are being stacked on each other, because the landfill is full. It is not clear to those of us who care what is the purpose of piling household waste like this. Perhaps the Cook Islands Government plans to export this waste, permitted for SIDS under the Basel Convention, to a developed country for environmentally-sound disposal. But in the past the Cook Islands Government has proposed installation of waste incineration.

A recent article from the BBC shows that scientists consider burning household waste as the dirtiest way to produce energy and negates any improvements in GHG releases obtained by closing down coal-fired generation (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cp3wxgje5pwo).

Personally, I compost household food scraps, feed any meat scraps or bones to the neighbour’s dog, recycle cans and bottles and permissible plastics like meat trays provided by supermarkets. What remains to be collected is usually plastic food wrappers like Gladwrap. If our Government chooses to install an incinerator for the purpose of disposing of household waste, it is likely that a large percentage of what will be incinerated will be plastic. In other countries, very strict standards for pollution control have reduced the releases of dioxin, a cancer-causing gas that forms when plastics furnaces are in the warm-up or cool-down phases, and have resulted in fewer lung problems for people living near incinerators. However, there remains the problem of how to dispose of the equally toxic soot or ash from the incinerator.  

The Hawaii Electric and Light utility said that they encase such soot or ash in concrete then bury it. But concrete has a life limit, and can break down in as little as 20 years if sand containing salt is used in making the concrete. If the Cook Islands were to encase such incinerator ash and soot in concrete and bury it, then in about 20 years’ time, you would expect the dioxins to leach out into waterways and the lagoon and getting into the seafood way to eat.

A meaningful way to celebrate 60 years of self-government in 2025 would be to spend a lot of money on achieving environmentally sound waste disposal, instead of big expensive functions which are of brief benefit to the health of Cook Islands people. 

Let’s put that on the top of the agenda for 2025!

Yours sincerely,

Concerned Citizen

(Name and address supplied)