The first incinerator in the United States was built on Governors Island, New York in 1885. In 1949, Robert C. Ross founded the first hazardous waste management company in the U.S., Robert Ross Industrial Disposal, after seeing a need for hazardous waste disposal in Ohio, and in 1958 the company built the nation's first incinerator for hazardous waste. In 1958, the company built the nation's first incinerator to process hazardous waste. The first full-scale, government-operated incineration facility in the U.S. was the Arnold O. Chantland Resource Recovery Plant, built in Ames, Iowa, in 1975 and in operation today, and produces refuse-derived fuel, which is then used as a fuel source for the production of waste. The plant was built in Ames, Iowa in 1975 and has been in operation ever since, and produces refuse-derived fuel, which is then sent to local power plants to be used as fuel for electricity generation. The first commercially successful incineration plant in the U.S. was Wheelabrator Technologies in Saugus, Massachusetts, built in October 1975 and in operation today.
Some of Robert Ross Industrial Disposal's environmental or waste disposal operations end up transporting waste to incinerators or cement kiln processing centers. in 2009, the company operated three main waste incineration businesses: Clean Harbours, WTI-Heritage, and Ross Incineration Services. Clean Harbours has purchased a number of smaller, independently operated facilities, gradually accumulating 5-7 incinerators throughout the U.S. WTI-Heritage has an incinerator located in the southeastern corner of Ohio. (across the Ohio River from West Virginia West Virginia).
Some of the older generation of incinerators in the U.S. have closed, including 186 MSW incinerators that closed in the 1990s, with only 89 left by 2007, and 6,200 medical waste incinerators that still existed in 1998, with only 115 left by 2003.
Some of the older generation of incinerators in the U.S. have closed. The main reasons why no new incinerators were built between 1996 and 2007 are mainly: 1.) Economic Factors: With the increase in large, low-cost regional landfills, and the relatively low price of electricity today, incinerators are unable to provide fuel (i.e., garbage) to compete in the U.S. The incinerators have not been able to compete in the U.S. with the other incinerators. 2.) Tax Policy: The U.S. repealed tax credits for waste-to-energy power plants from 1990 to 2004.
In the U.S. and Canada, there has been renewed interest in incineration of garbage and other waste-to-energy technologies. in 2004, waste incineration qualified for tax credits for renewable energy production in the U.S. The U.S. tax credit for waste-to-energy production is now available in the United States and Canada. Projects to increase the capacity of existing plants are underway, and, once again, municipalities are evaluating the construction of incineration plants rather than choosing to continue to dispose of municipal waste in landfills. However, many of these projects continue to face political opposition, although the arguments for incineration to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, enhance air pollution control, and recycle incineration ash have been updated. There has been a flurry of opposition to incineration in suburban London and in communities such as Murray Valley and the Lake Ontario region.
Because of the large number of landfills available to it, technology within the UK's waste management industry has lagged considerably behind that of the rest of Europe. The Landfill Directive, set up by the European Union, enables the UK government to implement waste management legislation, including the Landfill Tax and the Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme. The aim of the legislation is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from landfill through the use of alternative waste disposal methods. The UK government's position is that waste incineration will play a progressively more important role in the treatment of municipal waste and in the supply of energy, and in 2008, nearly 100 sites in the UK were identified as potential sites for future waste incineration. These sites have also been mapped by British non-governmental organizations.
In Russia, Greenpeace and Green Cross jointly launched a civic campaign against waste incineration in early 2008, with more than 113,000 residents signing an anti-burning petition to delay the construction of new waste incinerators.
In countries such as the Philippines, all forms of waste incineration have been banned.
In China, there have been ups and downs in popular defense activities in cities such as Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Guangzhou, Wuhan, Nanjing and Nanchang. A wide range of environmental volunteers and NGOs have been watching closely.
In international law, three principles have also been formulated to resist waste incineration, namely early warning, prevention and limiting transboundary impacts, among others.