Financial problems would be huge concerns of the proposal of the construction of the

super-incinerator. The construction requires a large amount of capital. With reference

to another news report of South China Morning Post, the construction is proposed to
involve HK$15 billion. It is a huge number that gets Hong Kong peoples attention on
this issue. After the construction, the maintenance is also another great quantity of
expenditures. Known from a letter to Panel on Environmental Affairs of legislative
Council sent by Non-incinerator Citizens of Japan, 5% to 20% of construction fee is
necessary for annual maintenance, which means 750 million to 11.25 billion is needs
every year to do the maintenance of the incinerator. The super-incinerator will be a
burden of Hong Kong.

MORE than half of those who took part in a survey support the
expansion of three landfills as well as the building of an incinerator
on Shek Kwu Chau ().
Nearly 1,000 people took part in the September poll conducted by
the City University of Hong Kong ( ). It was
commissioned by the World Green Organization ().
Around 53 percent of respondents backed expansion of the landfills.
Only 11 percent opposed it. Support for an incinerator in Shek Kwu
Chau was even higher at nearly 70 percent. Again, 11 percent
opposed it.
The organisation believes there is stronger support for building an
incinerator because the facility is far from urban areas. Many believe
the impact on people would be lowest.
But it found there is room for more public education. Only 21
percent know the landfills will reach their capacity by 2015. Fortytwo percent do not know when they will be full.
Also, only 6 percent know that it takes seven to nine years to build
an incinerator.
The group urged lawmakers and district council members to support
the landfill expansion and incinerator plans. It said that if the
facilities are not approved, Hong Kong will have no waste
management facilities by 2019.

Argument 1: Incinerators Are Very Expensive

Incinerators remain formidably expensive, but that expense is
often hidden from public view with giant public subsidies. To pay
for the capital and operating costs, as well as the operators profit
margins, the community or region will have to sign put-or-pay
agreements, which trap them for twenty-five years or more. As the
industry has struggled to make incineration safe, it has priced
itself out of the market or it would have if the market was applied
on a level playing field.
Over half the capital cost of an incinerator built today goes into air
pollution control equipment. Ironically, if the waste were not
burned in the first place this hugely expensive equipment would
not be necessary, nor would the toxic ash collected in these
devices have to be sent to an expensive hazardous waste landfill,
nor would the air emissions be subjected to very costly monitoring.
But the public is being kept ill informed about the poor economics
of incineration. Instead, they are being told that incineration is
going to save their communities money.