"Landfill incinerator delayed again, band council advanced $400,000"

Elected Chief Bill Montour says he's hopeful the Kearns waste disintegrator unit will be at the landfill by the end of February.

The highly-anticipated technology, which aims to disintegrate waste through a high-temperature heating process, was supposed to be here on Jan. 22 but weather problems and logistics caused delays.

"Jan. 22 was an arbitrary date that we wanted to get it (in)," said Montour. "It didn't happen. There was a number of components that did not get there, mainly the computer logic that comes from Mississauga."

Montour visited the machine's inventor, John Kearns, in Nova Scotia two weeks ago, and said all the parts for the unit have arrived and employees are currently assembling it. "I met with John for two hours and went over the whole thing," said Montour. "It's all there. It's just a matter of putting it together."

Band council has already advanced Kearns Waste Sciences Group $400,000 to complete the machine in a deal the two parties struck last fall that gives Six Nations a chance to test out the 20-tonne machine before it builds a permanent, custom-made unit specific to the community's waste needs.

The $400,000 will be considered a down-payment on a permanent machine that will be built once the community completes a waste audit determining Six Nations' long-term waste handling needs.

This is council's second attempt at bringing waste removal technology to Six Nations.

After passing a motion in 2009 to spend $5 million in community gaming funds on a state-of-the-art incinerator plant, the deal with B.C. company EnEco Systems went sour. The two are now embroiled in a lawsuit to recover lost Six Nations funds.

Montour said Kearns will be testing the machine next week. "He's got garbage ordered for the end of next week for the first burn. The day after the burn, they'll be taking it apart and shipping it here. I'm hoping the end of February."