Sir, Readers who have read the material accompanying the Oxfordshire Waste Partnership's consultation 'No Time to Waste' may be confused about the options presented to them, and which of them Friends of the Earth supports.

The OWP refers to incineration as Energy from Waste in the consultation. Members of the public should be under no illusion that this means burning household waste in an incinerator, albeit an incinerator fitted with some form of electricity generation. Waste is incinerated, and ash produced for disposal some of which is toxic. Where the No Time to Waste consultation refers to Mechanical Biological Treatment (MBT) as treating waste through mechanical and biological processes to produce fuel pellets to burn, then this is a gross simplification which is not necessarily correct.

Treating household waste by MBT will recover materials for recycling, and biologically treat the activity of the remainder so it is stable for disposal. The biogas produced by biologically treating the waste, through anaerobic digestion, can be burnt to produce clean renewable energy but note, the waste is not burnt and much less greenhouse gas is produced overall than by incineration. Oxfordshire will not initially exceed its allowances for disposing of the residue waste from MBT at landfill. Friends of the Earth supports MBT where it is used in this way, not for producing fuel pellets as the 'No Time to Waste' consultation says. If people would like further guidence on Friends of the Earth's response to the No Time to Waste consultation then they should visit our website at www.oxfoe.co.uk

Andrew Wood, Oxford Friends of the Earth