The Green Party has welcomed reports that the Poolbeg Incinerator project is likely to be dropped and calls on the Public Accounts Committee to formally investigate the actions of Dublin City Council in the mismanagement of this project.

Green Party Environment Spokesperson, Malcolm Noonan, said: "This was a Celtic Tiger folly which should have been scrapped years ago. We have wasted some €100 million in public money, a lot of which could have been saved if Dublin City Council had co-operated with John Gormley when he was Minister for the Environment.

-- Advertisement --

"This was always the wrong solution to Dublin's waste problem. The rise of recycling and a reduction in the production of unnecessary waste killed the project years ago but it has taken the council years to acknowledge that fact. We urgently need to learn lessons so that the same mistakes are not repeated in the roll out of Irish Water and future public projects.

"Dublin City Council has serious questions to answer. We already know that they illegally extended a contract with RPS, and the High Court found that they had illegally attempted to prop up the collapsing incinerator project by forcing private waste collectors to use it. The Public Accounts Committee needs to investigate why they agreed to take on Covanta as a private partner without re-opening the tender process. They also need to ask why they signed the agreement with Covanta during the 2007 general election campaign when no government was in place."

(CD/MH)